Gov Gretchen Whitmer, Democrat of Michigan, vetoed several Republican-sponsored bills on November 5 that would have granted tax credits for contributions to scholarship programs that could be used for nonpublic schooling, MLive reports.
Democratic critics of the legislation—Senate Bills 687 and 688 and House Bill 5405—said the bills would incentivize sending kids to private schools. But Republican supporters said they want Michigan parents to be able to use money from wealthy donors to help meet the educational needs of their children, including the use of alternative and nonpublic programs.
With the veto, bill supporters launched a petition initiative that could allow public funding to be steered to private schooling without Ms Whitmer’s approval. All they need is 340,000 signatures, and the campaign is well funded.
“Simply put, our schools cannot provide the high-quality education our kids deserve if we turn private schools into tax shelters for the wealthy,” MLive quoted the governor as saying in a letter that accompanied her veto. “The movement to privatize education in this state has been a catastrophic failure, causing Michigan students to fall behind the rest of the nation.”
Editorial
Supporters of the legislation were quoted as making remarks intended to misdirect hearers’ thoughts away from the main issue: vouchers and the killing of public schools. As far as that goes, nothing is stopping wealthy people from sending their money to fund private schools right now. The issue with these bills is that we don’t want ordinary citizens to pay for it with their tax dollars.
