Most People Support School Choice. Why Won’t They Vote For It?
On Tuesday, voters in Nebraska, Kentucky, and Colorado rejected school choice at the ballot box, voting against two pro-school choice state Constitutional Amendments and moving to repeal a school choice law. The defeat of all three measures signals a turning tide for school choice policies. After several years of major legislative and electoral successes—and a night where Republican politicians, who are more likely to support these measures, overperformed—voters themselves seemed resistant to approving individual pro-school choice ballot measures. However, this outcome isn’t exactly surprising.Â
“School choice has never—at least not that I can think of—been approved in a popular vote,” says Neal McCluskey, the director of The Cato Institute’s Center for Educational Freedom. “We see polling that typically shows people support school choice if you just sort of present them with, ‘hey, we could give you money and then you could use it to go seek the education of your choice.'” But, McCluskey adds, highly motivated public education employees manage to dominate the conversation when it comes to ballot measures.
“Referenda for school choice are always at a disadvantage because you’re trying to take on entrenched, easily organized interests who defend the status quo and they can put a lot of money into defending the status quo and a lot of boots on the ground,” says McCluskey.
In Nebraska, voters moved to repeal a school choice bill signed into law earlier this year. The law, Legislative Bill 1402, created scholarships allowing certain families—including low-income families, military families, those with special-needs children, or children facing other challenges like bullying—to allow eligible families to pay for private school with private money.Â
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