Mississippians went to the polls recently to vote on Initiative 42, which required the state legislature to fully fund the public schools. The initiative failed.
Who funded the opposition to Initiative 42?
Not Mississippians. According to this account of the post-campaign financial filings, 75% of the money to fight Initiative 42 came from outside Mississippi.
Here is a report on the scoundrels that don’t want to spend another penny on the education of children in Mississippi. How about those Koch brothers! They are billionaires, yet they put up nearly a quarter of a million dollars to block any increase in funding the education of children in Mississippi! What’s up with those guys? Why do national Republican PACs fight the fair funding of little children? Why is this an issue for them? I don’t get it. Here is an example of deceptive labeling: a group called “KidsFirst Mississippi” accepted the Koch money to oppose funding education for the kids. It should rename itself “KidsLast Mississippi” in the spirit of accurate advertising.
The article says:
Post-election campaign filings are revealing that opponents of Initiative 42, mostly from outside the state, spent much more money to defeat it than they were required to report before the polls closed. Initiative 42 would have changed the Mississippi Constitution to force the Legislature to follow state law and fully fund education or be subject to judiciary consequences. Campaign-finance reports for registered PACs and PICs were due on Nov. 10 for committee spending in October.
The Improve Mississippi Political Initiative Committee is the PIC that primarily ran the “No on 42” campaign with TV ads and a website, promoting fear that one (presumably black) judge in Hinds County would control education funding if 42 passed. Records filed Nov. 10 show the group spent $844,750 to defeat the citizen ballot.
About 82 percent of that money came from one donor: the RSLC Mississippi PAC, which is the state PAC arm of the Republican State Leadership Committee, a Washington, D.C.-based 527 political organization dedicated to “elect down-ballot, state-level Republican leaders.”
The RSLC Mississippi PAC gave $600,000 to the Improve Mississippi PIC in October, the PIC’s October campaign-finance report showed. Because RSLC Mississippi PAC did not donate to individual candidates in this election cycle, the PAC was not required to file reports, Secretary of State spokeswoman Pamela Weaver wrote in an email to the Jackson Free Press.
However, the RSLC Mississippi PAC’s latest report shows that it also donated $30,000 to The Watchdog PAC and $100,000 to the Mississippi House Republican Caucus PAC in September. The Watchdog PAC’s October campaign finance report reveals $100,000 in year-to-date donations from the RSLC Mississippi PAC on Oct. 9.
The Watchdog PAC then donated $90,000 to the Improve Mississippi PIC on Oct. 14, 19 and 27. If the Watchdog PAC used RSLC’s donation to fund its Improve MS PIC donation, which is unclear, the Republican State Leadership Committee gave $690,000 of the $844,750 donations used to defeat Initiative 42 through the PIC.
The Republican State Leadership Committee did not respond to requests for phone interviews, but instead provided emailed statements. RSLC is a national organization that focuses on state-level Republican leadership, largely through individual PAC arms for states. Funding for the 527 comes from several large, national corporations. According to 2014 Open Secrets data, RSLC’s top donors last year included the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, Reynolds American, Las Vegas Sands and Blue Cross/Blue Shield, who together donated more than $6 million. Walmart Stores and Koch Industries were also on the top-10 highest donor list.
Americans for Prosperity, the Koch brothers’ national advocacy organization, donated $239,097 to the KidsFirst Mississippi PAC, the other prominent anti-42 PAC, which placed radio, Facebook, Google and other media ads against Initiative 42, campaign-finance records show. The KidsFirst PAC only reported spending $123,193 on its October campaign-finance report.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
It is not as if these groups don’t know where their funds are coming from. I support a requirement that election materials that are paid for with outside funds in whole or substantial part need to be clearly labeled “Paid for by Outsiders” so that people will know who is paying for those materials. This has the attraction for donors of keeping their names secret, while exposing the fact that people who will not be affected by the legislation/candidate in question are paying for the ad/material.
I think the better question is “where were all the ed reform orgs?” They pour money into state initiatives to open more charter schools or push testing or ed tech. Why don’t they even advocate on behalf of public school funding?
The big hitters in ed reform could have turned this around. Imagine if Gates or Broad or Duncan had stepped in. They weigh in on state issues all the time and they have enormous clout and access. Why never on behalf of public schools?
The notable absence of the big ed reform players in the private sector and the federal government on public schools seems really odd to me. Duncan stepped in the middle of a state court case on ranking teachers in California, so he’s not reluctant to jump into state issues. He’s just…missing when it comes to basic funding of Mississippi public schools?
There must be thousands of (paid) ed reform advocates and political operatives and lobbying groups by now. Why don’t they ever advocate on behalf of public schools?
Sometimes an absence tells you more than a presence. We all know Koch opposes public schools. I’m wondering where the national “public education” advocates are.
Here’s the actual ed reform “movement” record on funding public schools:
“Public schools in most of the United States are receiving less state funding now than seven years ago, putting at risk the quality of education for many students, a new report shows.
The study by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities found that at least 31 states provided less funding per student in the 2014 school year than in 2008.”
They have thousands of paid advocates and political operatives, a huge wealthy donor base and hundreds of “orgs”. Yet US public schools lose funding each and every year.
What gives? How can they claim to be effective advocates for “public education” with this absolutely dismal record on the basic issue of funding?
http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2015/12/10/report-school-funding-cuts-still-affected-by-great-recession.html
Because, when it suits them, charter schools are public schools.
As the saying goes, Arkansas is thankful for Mississippi because, Arkansas avoids being the poorest state. The great plans of the Walton’s (headquartered in Arkansas) and the Koch’s- keeping America’s women, pregnant and barefoot and, the men, poor and suicidal.
These people are evil, pure evil
Their goals is to defund or starve public education, and then use the resulting “failure” or chaos — that was actually caused in large part by the defunding — as justification for converting all schools to private management, where there will be no transparency to the public, to accountability to the public via democratically elected school boards, and where they will not educate ALL the public—eschewing those most expensive and troublesome to educate (i.e. Special Ed, English Language Learners, homeless kids, foster care kids, behavior-problem kids for whatever reason.)
Thus, you have these stealth moves to block any funding for the schools.
What Broad hides from the public is the real Broad
EXAMPLE #1 — 2012 Prop. 30 Campaign:
A) FAKE BROAD that he shows to the world:
he claimed to support
Prop. 30, because he believed in supporting both sectors:
traditional public school & charter schools
B) REAL Broad that is hidden in order to manipulate and trick:
he was secretly funding an out-of-state group that was out to
defeat Prop. 30. This was and is part of the corporate reform
plan to starve the traditional public schools, triggering chaos
and low performance, then use that chaos & low performance
—that the corporate reformers actually cause through that
initial starvation —- as justification to do away with public
schools, and replace them with privatize charter schools.
When this hit the press, and the public got wind of it,
Prop 30’s numbers went up and it passed;
————————–
EXAMPLE #2 — Broad Plan — Leaked version VS. newest version:
A) FAKE BROAD that he shows to the world:
embarassed by the version that was leaked
late last summer, and from the negative reaction from
educators and the public, Broad’s lackeys have produced this
kinder, gentler (and phony-as-a-three-dollar-bill) version that
claims it values both public schools and charters, and will
fund both sectors’ schools that have a proven track record;
they’re now claiming the plan will help ALL schools —
charter and public, and even taking all the Broad
references out of it, and having another unknown
billionaire front it;
they’ve successfully used this to get Schmerelson to water
down the anti-Broad Plan motion… it’s working
B) REAL BROAD that is hidden in order to manipulate and trick:
that version that was leaked is a total, full-out assault on
traditional public school, filled with every lie and exaggeration
that corporate reform uses, while the charter sector was
celebrated as the Second Coming of Jesus, and that the
traditional schools have to be replaced by the wonderful
charters (NOTE: AALA put out a letter debunking all
the positive stats celebrating charters are all phony, and
debunked them thoroughly)
In Example #1, remember: BROAD LIED about
his support for Prop 30, claiming one thing while
doing another.
In Example #2, he’s doing it again.
As Maya Angelou said, “When people show you
who they are, believe them.”
Had Prop 30 failed, students would have lost
a full month of school in the 2012-2013 school
year (i.e. the difference between its passing and
its failing to pass) class size would have
sky-rockted, thousands of teachers would have
been laid off, etc.
Broad was willing to inflict this chaos and destruction
as a means to his goal of privatizing LAUSD like
they privatized New Orleans schools. He was willing
to damage those children’s educations to acheive his
ignoble goals.
This is not a man that anyone in this district
should pay attention to, nor should anyone give
credence to anyone from the Broad Foundation,
or any group that Broad funds.
While the “outside SCOTUS voice” fought the “fair funding”, they can’t stop a private
citizen from investing in education through personal donations. The “locals” could
pretend a political solution is in the works, OR donate to the cause of their beliefs.
Waiting to be “saved” by the “political” seems like waiting for the emperor to get
his suit cleaned…
The U.S. Supreme Court’s most egregious decision was the one that makes those citizens, least able to afford it, try to pay for a seat at the table, where political policy is made.
Why were the people of Mississippi so stupid? Of course, here in Texas we’re not much brighter
Indiana finally got smart and voted out Tony Bennett, who was supported by outsiders (Koch and Walton). Now if we can just expel the governor, also bought and paid for….
TBH, It’s no one’s fault but the people of MS. They continue to vote for people by name or race even though for nearly 20+ years nothing has changed. If the ppl of MS want change, they will make it happen. Most are satisfied with status quo and others are too uneducated to ask the appropriate questions.
I was lucky enough to make the right choice after highschool and left the state. Every time I visit, NOTHING has changed. I try to explain to friends and family of how to make change, or how life is different outside of the state but to no avail. Unfortunately, MS will still be MS after the next 20+ years because anyone that leaves and improve NEVER go back.
Its easy to make change and it doesn’t ALWAYS have to come from gov’t. It can start door to door, or neighborhood to neighborhood. Most areas have run down houses that remind me of the Dominican Republic. Dogs run loose on the street with trash, drug addicts and prostitutes hanging out on corners. People can easily start by cleaning up and demanding change.
Question the school leadership. Dupree hasn’t improved anything in 20 years. Voting for change is hard when govt supporting you comes easy. Comforting the people with “just enough” keeps them from revolting and money in the pockets of those already in power. Don’t worry about MS because if the ppl don’t finally stand up, it’ll be left in the same state as it has been in more than 50 years. This vote shows just that.