When Governor Greg Abbott sold his voucher program, he talked about helping the poorest kids escape public schools and choose better private schools; he talked about enabling those with disabilities go to private schools. He talked about spreading opportunity through school choice.

Some moderate Republicans and rural Republicans supported their community public schools, and they repeatedly voted down Abbott’s vouchers. So Abbott used the millions of dollars contributed by Pennsylvania billionaire to replace them with conservatives who backed vouchers.

But now the data are in on which students are getting vouchers. Three-quarters of them are private school students. This is similar to what happened in other states. Vouchers are not about helping public school students; the reality is that they subsidize kids who never attended public schools.

Maryam Ahmed of The Dallas Morning News reported:

As Texas’ $1 billion school choice program approaches rollout this fall, preliminary data shows most of the program’s applicants were already enrolled in private schools, fewer applications came from families in poorer districts, and less that 30 students with special needs got the top award amount of $30,000.

The Dallas Morning News analyzed data from the Texas Comptroller of Public Accounts, which runs the Texas Education Freedom Account program.

The first year of TEFA has exposed key challenges voucher programs have faced nationwide: insufficient funding for some families to make the move to expensive private schools, difficulties for special education students finding private schools that can support their needs, and minimal benefits for lower-income and rural families.

Since similar data are reported in every state that has no income limits, it’s reasonable to conclude that the transfer of public money to kids in religious and private schools is a feature of school choice, not a bug.

Out of 5.4 million students enrolled in Texas public schools, 275,000 applied for vouchers. The legislation, passed last year, offers students $10,474 while disabled students can receive up to $30,000. Homeschooled students can get $2,000. Median private school tuition is about $9,400, not including books and transportation. Elite private schools charge much more.

Now we learn that the purpose of the voucher program was to “ease the burden” on families already paying for private school, not to help kids in public school:

TEFA spokesperson Travis Pillow said the program’s goal is not to “lure away” public school students but make private school affordable across the board. Many families with children in private school make major sacrifices to keep them there, Pillow said, and TEFA eases that burden….

Out of 5.45 million public school students in Texas, only about 68,000 even applied for TEFA — barely one percent. Half of those students were awarded funds, as of June 16 records provided to The Dallas Morning News, but more could drop out of the program if they can’t find a school to fit their needs.

But even a small drop in public school enrollment leads to budget cuts.

Florida’s voucher program has ballooned to more than $4 billion dollars since it was implemented in 2023, taking up nearly a quarter of the state’s public school fund.  In Arizona, which has the country’s oldest universal school choice program, vouchers contributed to a $1.4 billion budget shortfall in 2024…

In Texas, public school districts receive a $6,215 allotment per student from the state, meaning fewer public school students directly translates to less funding…

About one in four of the voucher awards went to students with disabilities but only 20 in the entire state received the top award of $25,000-$30,000. However, private schools are not bound by federal law and may deny admission to students with disabilities. It is anticipated that many who received vouchers may return to their public school, where they are guaranteed admission and services.

If the state’s public education budget becomes strained, said Daniel DeMatthews, an educational policy professor at the University of Texas at Austin, lower-income and rural districts would likely be hit hardest.