We have talked about ALEC and its negative impact on the Kansas legislature for years. Read this detailed piece to understand more. The tax credit scholarship program in Kansas came from an ALEC bill, and the Hope voucher program the House K-12 Education Budget Committee tried to insert into the education funding bill this year is also an ALEC bill. Kansas doesn’t need ALEC bills pushed by the Koch brothers and other proponents of harmful education policies-we need local bills to address local issues.

“Edwards said she realized in retrospect that students with disabilities were used as a Trojan horse to put on the legislative agenda a fringe idea that was part of a much bigger campaign. In the years that followed, 19 other states debated 93 nearly identical proposals based on model legislation. They became law in Florida, Mississippi, Nevada, North Carolina and Tennessee.

“‘Every single, little expansion, if you look at who’s behind it, it is the people that want to get that door kicked open for private religious education,’ Edwards said. ‘All we (families with disabled students) are was the way for them to crack open the door…’”

“Bills to modify Arizona’s voucher program were soon introduced. One bore a striking resemblance to model legislation from the Heartland Institute, granting vouchers to any parent who feels their child is unsafe or being bullied at school…

“Edwards, the voucher supporter-turned opponent, noted that just like the first Arizona bill granting vouchers to children with disabilities, Bolick had sympathetic victims—kids who’d been bullied—to help sell her bill…

“A letter to the editor appeared in The Arizona Republic defending renewed efforts to expand the voucher program despite defeat at the ballot box.

“The letter’s author, Scott Kaufman, wasn’t a concerned parent, or even an Arizona resident.

“He had sent his letter from the Washington, D.C., suburbs, from a model-bill factory: the American Legislative Exchange Council.”

https://www.usatoday.com/…/abortion-gun-laws-st…/3162173002/

Originally posted to Facebook on 04/09/2019.