How the plot to end Illinois’ school choice program is playing out – Wirepoints

By: Ted Dabrowski and John Klingner

Two weeks ago Wirepoints warned that the Invest in Kids Act was at real risk of being eliminated by Gov. J.B. Pritzker and the legislature. The reauthorization of the tax-credit scholarship program, which currently gives more than 9,000 kids access to a better education, is being blocked by anti-school-choice lawmakers. 

We said those lawmakers’ efforts would look something like this: 

“Pritzker and [Chicago Mayor] Johnson want to move the reauthorization of the program out of the state’s budget negotiation process – where it has a higher likelihood of passing – and to the veto session later this year. There, the scholarship language will then end up as stand-alone legislation – a single bill that the teachers unions can focus all their efforts on killing.”

Chalkbeat effectively confirmed that strategy on Wednesday, stating: “a spokesperson from the Speaker of the House said the Illinois general assembly has until the end of the year to extend Invest in Kids.” In other words, the scholarships won’t be part of the budget negotiations this week and will instead be pushed to later in the year, just as we warned.

The speaker’s words echo the non-response by Gov. Pritzker several days ago. When asked about whether the scholarship program was on the chopping block, a spokesman said: “The Invest in Kids Act has to pass the General Assembly. If it doesn’t pass that would not be the Governor eliminating it, that would be the General Assembly eliminating it.”

Barring major changes in negotiations, both Welch and Pritzker virtually signaled a death sentence for the program in their responses.

The details

The best chance for the Invest in Kids Act to get extended is to be part of the state’s overall budgeting process. It’s how the scholarship was reauthorized in 2022. All kinds of initiatives get added to the massive budget bill as part of the typical horse trading that goes on. Get a program into the 1,000-page budget and it’s basically secure – the budget is an all-or-nothing vote.

The final budget negotiations are going on right now, with anti-school-choice legislators trying to water down the current scholarship program as part of the deliberations. For example, sources we’ve talked to say opponents may try to slash the size of the program or the size of the tax credit.

Count on scholarship advocates to balk at those changes, giving opponents the chance to declare an impasse. That, in turn, will result in the program’s reauthorization being pulled out of the budget so it can be further “negotiated” during the veto session in the fall.

And as we said above, the reauthorization will end up as a single bill that teachers unions can bring all their powers to bear against.

With all that union pressure bearing down on them, there’s little chance legislators will vote to keep the Invest in Kids Act alive – barring some form of last-minute dealmaking.

It’s the demands of teachers unions versus the hopes and dreams of more than 9,000 students from low-income, working-class families. Unfortunately, this is Illinois. We all know which one lawmakers will pick.

**********

P.S. Ironically, Indiana this week passed a budget which vastly expands the state’s existing school choice programs. The program is now “near-universal” with almost every student in the state given access to the school of their choice.

Read more from Wirepoints:

• Illinois on track to become first state to kill school choice
• ‘They got rid of spelling, phonics and penmanship. That’s why black children cannot read.’
• Educational freedom for Illinois children could look like this: Iowa’s Students First Act
• Chicago Public Schools wants help with massive deficits despite billions in federal aid, plummeting enrollment
• Poor student achievement and near-zero accountability: An indictment of Illinois’ public education system – Wirepoints Special Report