Press Release: State Supreme Court Upholds Rogers' Win Against Private School VoucherStatutory Initiative

This most recent defeat completes a clean sweep over all 2022 efforts by a right-wing special interest group to divert public tax dollars to private schools 

Las Vegas, NV - Beverly Rogers and Rory Reid, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of the Rogers Foundation, have prevailed again in the Nevada Supreme Court, defeating an appeal by private school voucher proponents of a decision by the lower court that halted a statutory ballot initiative that would send public tax dollars to unaccountable and often discriminatory private schools. 

Earlier this year, Rogers and Reid challenged two initiatives brought forth by the right-wing Education Freedom PAC, a political group led by Erin Phillips of Power2Parent. A constitutional initiative would have forced taxpayers to fund private and homeschool vouchers, even for the wealthy already attending private schools. A second statutory initiative aimed to put back into law the defunct private school voucher program known as “Education Savings Accounts” (ESAs). 

The Supreme Court previously had held that the constitutional initiative language put forth by the PAC was “deceptive and misleading” to voters, ultimately halting the initiative. That scheme would have cost taxpayers more than $300 million per year to fund wealthy families already attending private schools, but the ballot failed to acknowledge and inform voters of its high cost and detrimental impact on public schools. It also failed to propose a funding source, as required by law. 

In today’s ruling, the Court also struck down the PAC’s statutory initiative that would have revived a controversial universal private school voucher scheme known as ESA's. The Supreme Court halted a similar law in 2016, as the program was funded by siphoning dollars away from public schools. Later, the entire ESA law was rejected by lawmakers and repealed completely. This initiative attempted to reinstate that scheme, but the Court recognized the PAC’s effort to circumvent the constitutional requirement that all statutory initiatives that cost money to implement must have a revenue source. The initiative attempted to leave funding ESA's optional, but the Court held that any attempt to fund ESA's would fall on the backs of taxpayers, and therefore it halted the ballot initiative.

“This is the nail in the coffin for these ballot initiative efforts,” said Beverly Rogers. “We know this and other out-of-state funded right-wing groups won’t stop trying to siphon tax dollars away from neighborhood public schools for private schools. Public schools are worth protecting because they serve ALL students and are accountable to the people. Education shouldn’t be about profit, it should be about serving kids and their communities.”

“The courts would not allow voters to be misled by deceptive language or attempts to circumvent constitutional requirements. It’s no secret that their language was vague, as they did not want to reveal the  actual harm these vouchers would have on our communities, especially our most vulnerable students,” said Rory Reid.

Bradley Schrager of Wolf, Rifkin, Shapiro, Schulman & Rabkin represented Rogers and Reid in each of the district court and Supreme Court cases. 

“These right-wing groups have tried to bring harmful private school vouchers to Nevada by constitutional and statutory initiatives and have failed on all fronts. We defeated them in 2016 and we defeated them again in 2022,” said Rogers. “This is a win for Nevada families and students and we are proud to fight on their behalf.”

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