Following a forceful response from Senate Democratic Leader Priya Sundareshan to the Republican behind the scenes scheming to “enshrine” their welfare for the rich entitlement program known as the Empowerment Scholarship Account Private School Voucher System in the State Constitution, Legislative Democrats gathered with public school activists to call attention to the MAGA ‘hijacking” of the Public School Funding Proposition 123 renewal where they reportedly intend to include the formalizing of the voucher program in its ballot referral.
In the event’s opening remarks, Senate Assistant Democratic Leader Catherine Miranda said:
“Proposition 123 is not a tool to be hijacked by Republicans to provide an untouchable lifeline of public taxpayer dollars to private school corporations. Going back to the issue of transparency. What my Republican counterparts are not telling you is that there are special interest groups pressuring them to find a way to constitutionally protect private school vouchers, even if the mechanism for doing so is unconstitutional.”
Arizona Education Association President Marisol Garcia offered:
“Finally, the quiet part was said out loud is. We’re going to leverage how much we care about Public Schools and force down the throats of privatized or privatized organizations to ensure that they get their piece of the taxpayer pie enshrined in the Constitution. I think most Arizonans can think of 15 other things that should be entriden in the Constitution before ensuring that public (I think she meant private) companies get their share of taxpayer money with no transparency and no accountability.”
House Democratic Assistant Leader Nancy Gutierrez remarked:
“It takes a village to run a public school, and we shouldn’t be funding these controversial run away billion dollar ESA voucher programs for private schools and in tying them in the Constitution where it can never be touched or reformed. It’s a false choice, and it’s ridiculous. These ideas don’t belong in the same bill. The Republicans are throwing entitlement vouchers. Yes, entitlement vouchers because they know that we have rejected this idea on its own. Voters have rejected this over and over again. Arizona already has school choice school. Choice has nothing to do with vouchers all right, And in fact, most Arizonans choose Public Schools like I did for my children. But trying to give constitutional protection for spending your taxpayer dollars on expresso machines, luxury car driving lessons, and bounce houses with no hope of common sense guardrails or reforms is wrong and should be stricken from the plan.“
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