Abbott signs billion-dollar Texas school choice bill into law

Washington Examiner ^ | 5/3/25 | Elaine Mallon

[EnderWiggin1970]

Texas Republican Gov. Greg Abbott signed legislation on Saturday to create a $1 billion fund for school voucher programs — the largest day-one school choice bill in the nation’s history.

Abbott was joined by Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, Texas House Speaker Dustin Burrows, the bill’s author State Sen. Brandon Creighton, and school choice advocates. The governor celebrated the bill’s passage by a vote of 85-63 in the Texas House two weeks ago.

“Today is the culmination of a movement that has swept across our state and across our country,” Abbott said before signing the bill. “A movement driven by parents like Shanira who wanted a better education option for her son who was struggling in a low-performing school; a movement driven by educators like Inge right here, [who] left a teaching position in a public school because he saw that the unique needs of every student simply was not being met, so he started his own private school in Tyler, Texas, to better address those needs.”

“A movement driven by activists across the state, fueled by a vision for an education system that levels the playing field for parents and expands opportunity for our great children; a movement driven by families who shared my vision that it is time we put our children on a pathway to having the No. 1 ranked education system in the United States of America, knowing that school choice is part of the formula of achieving that mission,” Abbott continued.

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TOPICS: Business/Economy; Constitution/Conservatism; Government; Philosophy
KEYWORDS: education; freemarket; teachers; texas; vouchers

[EnderWiggin1970]

“This voucher bill will eventually destroy public schools,” Democratic Rep. Alma Allen said when the bill passed in the Texas House. “I give it 10 years, five sessions from now. Once you open the box, many of these will pop up and will eventually destroy our public schools.”

It's not often I agree with a Democrat but... from your lips to God's ears lady. Let's hope so!

[joshua c]

she says that like its a bad thing

[DIRTYSECRET]

Great but what are the bills’ flaws? Government control of home schoolers?

For starters the good kids parents will get hit up big time by teachers who can pick and choose. Hopefully extra money will be available for special needs.

I think the three R’s can be taught in 3 hours a day. The rest should be all electives/interests.

[Steve_Seattle]

“This voucher bill will eventually destroy public schools,” Democratic Rep. Alma Allen said when the bill passed in the Texas House."

Translation: The public schools are so bad that they won't survive any competition.

This law is a basic ex ample of the fairness that Democrats proclaim but don't really want. Before this law, anyone who sent their kids to private schools still had to pay for the public schools through property taxes or some other form of taxation. Now, everyone gets their fair share of the education tax dollars. Depending on the school, they still may have to supplement the state voucher with their personal funds, but at least they get something for their tax dollars.

[ComputerGuy]

So, are Texans going to be paying for two competing school systems?

[traderrob6]

Her statement would only prove true if “public schools” were worse then the alternative. Since she obviously believes that to be the case, so be it.

[Jane Long]

Unfortunately....this bill doesn’t defund anything from the leftist ran public schools, from what I’ve seen.

Hoping the report I read is wrong.

[adorno]

If education k-12 is a right for all kids, then school choice should also be a right, NATIONWIDE.

And while at it, whatever the governments collect for their education districts for public education should also pay for schools of choice; after all, taxes are collected from ALL parents equally. Discriminating against school choice should be outlawed.

[nagant]

Welcome to madrasas funded by .....YOU.

[DesertRhino]

Government control of home schoolers? Oh yeah....

Take the example of the Texas gun law for it’s definitions, explanations and byzantine sections and subsections.

https://statutes.capitol.texas.gov/Docs/PE/htm/PE.46.htm

Here’s their law on flying a drone.

https://statutes.capitol.texas.gov/docs/gv/htm/gv.423.htm

Texas suffers from it’s German roots. There is a manic Teutonic desire to codify and organize everything in minute detail. It’s surprising when the supposed Texas ethos is “freedom”.

Texas has a general principle of freedom... but the legislature massively details everything in great specificity. The Texas approach to Covid is a good example.

There are 530 amendments to the Texas constitution.

So yeah, home schooling will work there, but I suspect there will be a massive compliance and oversight methodology. Also the Educators in Texas have massive political power.

[Jacquerie]

<>Welcome to madrasas funded by .....YOU.<>

Quite right.

Islam is barbarism in religious drag. It deserves no 1st Amendment protection.

Public funding of islam is analogous to funding MS-13 or Tren de Aragua.

[magna carta]

yes madrassa support will help that tumor grow much bigger. Two of the people supporting this have also supported Colony Ridge.

The gateway to reg the homeschoolers has arrived....

Would have been better to work on eliminating property taxes.

[Wayne07]

Public schools get funded based on how many students they have, so when students leave for private or home schools, it defunds public schools.

[Wayne07]

“Welcome to madrasas funded by .....YOU.”

What are you going to do? Force all kids into crap secular liberal public schools just to block some fraction of the 1.5% muslim population in Texas from starting a madrasa?

[Texan5]

They will get defunded-in a totally natural way-like marketing any product, and assessing results. If the parents are dissatisfied with the public school product and results, they choose the private school for their kid(s) because it has a better product/performance, and the money goes there-not to just the public school anymore. The public school loses funds every time a parent removes a kid from there and into a private school-just like a company loosing customers to a competitor with a better product. No harm, no foul-no frivolous lawsuits from the public school lobby-this is just fair market competition...

Sooner or later, the public school looses so many students and so much revenue that they either improve their product or go under-perfectly natural...

[heylady]

If this bill is aimed at giving families money to send their failing children to private schools it will be a disaster. A private school in Texas is $30,000 a year. Will the schools HAVE to take on a student getting a $7,000 voucher from the state? This is going to destroy private schools once the government gets their nose under the tent.

[wintertime]

Right now, I am forced to fund godless, intolerant, Marxist-run indoctrination camps that are wrongly called “public schools”.

If I refuse to fund this NON-neutral religious worldview in my state’s K-12 schools, armed police are prepared to kill me if I am sufficiently resistant. (Real bullets in those guns on the hip!)

If you don’t want madrassas schools, then restrict Muslim immigration.

Axiom: NO school can be religiously, culturally, or politically neutral. Such neutrality can not exist in the mind of any sentient being .

[heylady]

Just to be clear, if you want your child in private school give up the money you spend on luxuries, that you consider necessities, to pay for it yourself. Private schools should make incoming students take a test before being admitted. You don’t pass, you don’t get in. My children gave up a great deal so I could afford to send them to private schools. Yes, one of the things was food. They had clothes because people I worked with would fill up a great big garbage bag with their children’s used clothes and you could see me trudging up Smith Street with the bag slung over my shoulder because we had to forgo an automobile. I know, BOO HOO

[I got the rope]

3 to 4 the hours is all you need. Proof is in the pudding. I homeschooled and privates schooled my kids. Tl

[I got the rope]

No it won’t. Private schools interview every applicant and their parents. You don’t just get to send your kid to any private school. Doesn’t work that way.