AUSTIN, Texas — Texas House Speaker Dade Phelan is supporting making school vouchers a priority for the 2025 legislative session. His support comes after a powerful group of Republicans tried to unseat him and other House Republicans during the March primary election. Those Republicans blamed Phelan and others for the failure of the school voucher plan to allocate public dollars to private schools. 

What You Need To Know

  • Texas House Speaker Dade Phelan has signaled he intends to support school vouchers during the upcoming legislative session

  • Phelan and some rural Republicans were blamed for the failure of vouchers during the last session 

  • Vouchers, championed by Gov. Greg Abbott, would allocate public dollars to private schools 

  • Some Texas Democrats are campaigning against vouchers 

Averie Bishop is going door-to-door trying to earn enough votes to unseat Rep. Angie Chen Button, R-Richardson. Bishop is one of several Democrats trying to flip state House districts this election by going after Republican education funding and school voucher plans. 

“I’m block walking here today because five elementary schools in Richardson have shut down due to underfunding,” said Bishop. “First thing I’m going to do is stop school vouchers. Second, increase the basic student allotment per student. It has not increased in six years.” 

Rep. Button voted in favor of educational vouchers in previous regular sessions but did not provide an updated statement. She did post last week on her campaign Facebook page that she is “committed to helping parents access the right educational path for their children while also ensuring our schools receive the funding they need.” 

Gov. Greg Abbott refused to approve an increase in school funding without passing a school voucher program that would allow families to use state funding for private or homeschool educations. 

“The whole theory is that you lower the barrier to entry for families who wish they could provide a tailored education to their children, but currently can’t because they’re paying twice for education,” said Jeremy Newman with the Texas Home School Coalition. 

Democrats and rural House Republicans voted against the voucher plan during the last legislative session.

Abbott called three special sessions where school vouchers never made it to the House floor for a vote. That led to Abbott campaigning in the primary elections against GOP members who didn’t support his voucher plan. That includes Phelan, who recently outlined his policy priorities to include “a strong focus on school choice and education funding, with close collaboration planned with Gov. Abbott.” 

Panhandle-area Rep. Ken King is another one of the few Republicans who survived the political attacks. 

“A voucher program does not benefit the children I represent and has no hope of doing so. Saying that, I recognize that other parts of the state, that different elected officials have a different opinion of this. I’ve always said that I would support school vouchers when we fully fund public education,” said King. 

Despite his reservations, King expects vouchers to become a reality after this session.