Joanna LeFebvre

This past Friday, the Trump Administration made a choice to cut support for vital services people depend on like education funding for children with special needs, financial services in underserved communities, and public health readiness.

🧵

Must read thread on new study showing school vouchers are spurring enrollment in small Christian private schools--the same schools that research suggests produce some of the poorest academic outcomes for students:

School districts can anticipate funding chaos in the coming months stemming from an unprecedented lack of enrollment data as students switch between private and public schools. As Sen. Don Gaetz (R-Pensacola) told @politico.com:

Once again, Florida shows what’s waiting for other states that careen toward universal school vouchers: public schools that can’t pay teachers, school closures that dislocate communities, & budget woes from trying to fund two separate education systems. subscriber.politicopro.com/article/2025...

Targeted Reforms Are the Best Way to Promote Property Tax Equity Without Harming Local Services | Center on Budget and Policy Priorities Local public services are cornerstones of our communities, ensuring that our children are educated, our communities are safe and healthy, and public spaces like parks and libraries can be enjoyed by.....

This special session, while thoughtful, was not the last word on property tax reform in DE. Lawmakers can do more to assist low-income renters & homeowners by creating circuit breaker credits that reduce their tax bills & improving administrative processes. www.cbpp.org/blog/targete...

Delaware Explained: Property reassessment Property reassessment notices have been scaring residents across Delaware, but the impact on tax rates has yet to be determined.

State legislators in 2023 also passed legislation mandating that reassessments occur every five years, helping to make sure this situation doesn’t happen again. However, ideally, reassessments should occur every 1 to 2 years. spotlightdelaware.org/2024/11/25/e...

Since the last assessment in the ‘80s, taxable values in New Castle Cty quadrupled on average. But frequent assessments result in gradual changes in values & tax bills that reflect the true property value, making budgeting easier & fairer for homeowners. www.delawareonline.com/story/news/2...

The session was responding to New Castle County’s (DE’s largest county & home to Wilmington) first full reassessment in decades, where homeowners’ property tax bills increased dramatically due to home values increasing more rapidly than commercial property values.

Tax History Matters: A Q&A with Professor Andrew Kahrl, Author of ‘The Black Tax’ In his new book, The Black Tax: 150 Years of Theft, Exploitation, and Dispossession in America, Professor Andrew Kahrl walks readers through the history of the property tax system and its structural d...

While property taxes fund impt services like schools, historically, high late payment penalties & predatory tax sales have stripped low-income families & communities of color of their wealth. DE’s reform is a step to prevent this history from reoccurring. itep.org/tax-history-...

Governor Meyer, Legislature Deliver Property Tax Relief And Reform - State of Delaware News DOVER — Last night, Governor Matt Meyer signed several bipartisan reforms to provide immediate relief to Delaware homeowners facing sharp property tax increases and to ensure fairness following the st...

One new law also gives homeowners more flexibility by allowing payment plans for bills increasing by $300 or more. It also suspends late payment penalties for homeowners on payment plans and substantially reduces these penalties for anyone not on payment plans. news.delaware.gov/2025/08/13/g...

The state legislature passed laws last month that allow cities, counties, and school districts to set separate property tax rates for residential & commercial properties, helping them rebalance the scales and ensure that businesses are paying their fair share to support schools.

Delaware is protecting critical funding for services like public schools while more equitably distributing property tax responsibility among homeowners & businesses. Here’s what other states can learn from DE’s thoughtful approach to #PropertyTax reform from last month's special session. 🧵

Tracking the Fallout From State Tax Cuts | Center on Budget and Policy Priorities States have gone on a tax-cutting spree in recent years. More than half have slashed income taxes for wealthy people and corporations, in some cases by extraordinary amounts. Communities are starting ...

Kentucky’s Woodford County Public Schools, which serves middle-income families in rural communities outside of Lexington, may need a short-term payroll loan — a red flag for broader school finance instability in the state. More from @joannalefebvre.bsky.social: www.cbpp.org/research/sta...

Tracking the Fallout From State Tax Cuts | Center on Budget and Policy Priorities States have gone on a tax-cutting spree in recent years. More than half have slashed income taxes for wealthy people and corporations, in some cases by extraordinary amounts. Communities are starting ...

Wyoming Passes 25% Property Tax Cut for Homeowners — Without Replacing Lost Revenue for Local Services: "As a result, local officials are having to cut their budgets by up to 23 percent, and the state is now facing a $686 million school funding deficit by 2030." www.cbpp.org/research/sta...

States are increasingly calling for special sessions this year, and it’s not just routine business. From addressing the impact of federal policy, to state tax debates, to shoring up disaster aid and political power plays, 2025 is shaping up to be a year of legislative overtime.🧵

🚨 BREAKING: A shocking $440M in unused ESA voucher funds are sitting in bank accounts — while AZ's public schools are left under-resourced and struggling.

This hoarding of taxpayer dollars by mostly wealthy families hurts public school students who go without needed supports 😠

See How Much Federal Money Trump Is Holding Back From Your District Hundreds of districts will lose more than $1 million each, according to a new analysis.

Yesterday, I shared my @educationwork.newamerica.org team's district impact analysis of the $6+ billion that the Trump admin is refusing to disburse to schools (link in 2nd post). Now, @edweek.org has published our funding figures for ALL districts in the US for which we have data. Search for yours↓

"Eight states—AL, AZ, FL, GA, ID, IN, NE and NC—saw their real per-pupil education expenditures decline even while their per capita GDP went up. These eight states had the capacity to expand educational opportunities for their state’s children but have gone in the opposite direction instead."

Senate Megabill Takes Cap Off Unprecedented Private School Voucher Tax Credit, Potentially Raising Cost by Tens of Billions Relative to House Version The tax and spending legislation approved by the U.S. Senate would create an unprecedented, dollar-for-dollar federal tax credit designed to support private school vouchers. This tax credit has the po...

New analysis from @itep.org: if only 25% of eligible tax filers were to claim the school voucher tax credit in the Senate's reconciliation bill, federal revenue would be reduced by over $25 billion per year - far more than previous versions. itep.org/trump-megabi...

Make no mistake-- today’s Supreme Court ruling does not end constitutionally guaranteed birthright citizenship. However, the SCOTUS has ruled against the injunctions that have been blocking The Trump Administration’s birthright citizenship EO from being implemented nationwide.

Instead of using a tax shelter for the wealthy to weaken the public schools that serve 90% of kids, lawmakers should invest in students and take us one step closer to the promise of an excellent public education for every child.

9 things to know about the big, private-school voucher plan in Republicans' tax bill NPR asked researchers, advocates, tax experts, a parent and a public school leader for their thoughts on this first-of-its-kind national voucher plan. Here's what they said.

See this piece from @npr.org for a deeper dive into 9 things to know about the federal school voucher proposal: www.npr.org/2025/05/23/n...

Kentucky Voters Buried Private School Vouchers. One More Idea Must Die to Truly Reinvest in Our Public Schools - Kentucky Center for Economic Policy Kentucky can't truly reinvest in our public schools unless lawmakers abandon the goal of eliminating the state's income tax.

Vouchers are often unpopular, incl. in red states, b/c voters prefer to spend public $ on public schools: Kentucky voters rejected a ballot measure last fall in all 120 counties that would have amended the KY constitution to allow school vouchers. @kypolicy.bsky.social kypolicy.org/kentucky-vot...

Federal Voucher System — Like Florida’s — Would Divert Funding to Private Schools and Home-Schoolers Florida has lessons to offer about vouchers.

Experts at @floridapolicy.bsky.social warn a federal voucher cld explode in cost over time if expanded, as happened in Florida. FL’s vouchers now eat up more than 25% of the state’s K-12 budget, w/ most $$ subsidizing students who already attended private school www.floridapolicy.org/posts/federa...

House Tax Bill Enlists the Wealthy to Spread Private School Vouchers The House tax plan cuts charitable giving tax incentives for donors to most nonprofit groups while roughly tripling the incentive available to donors to groups that fund private K-12 school vouchers. ...

The House’s national school voucher would reduce federal revenue by about $20B per Congress's JCT and state revenue by over $450M per @itep.org. Costs would increase if extended beyond 2029 like the Senate version or if the program expands as they have in many states. itep.org/house-tax-bi...

Samantha Jacoby on X: "House Rs’ tax bill includes a new federal tax credit to subsidize private school vouchers — effectively the first nationwide voucher program. Plus, it’s structured as a costly tax break for the wealthy w/an egregious capital gains tax loophole. It should be rejected." / X House Rs’ tax bill includes a new federal tax credit to subsidize private school vouchers — effectively the first nationwide voucher program. Plus, it’s structured as a costly tax break for the wealthy w/an egregious capital gains tax loophole. It should be rejected.

As CBPP's Samantha Jacoby explains, the school vouchers would be funded with a $1 for $1 tax break for contributions to voucher-bundling orgs—more generous than any other charitable deduction. And those who give stock would benefit from an egregious capital gains tax shelter. x.com/jacsamoby/st...

How vouchers harm public schools: Calculating the cost of voucher programs to public school districts Overview What this report is about Voucher programs for schools are rapidly expanding across the country. Under these programs, public budgets provide funding to parents to either send their children ...

A national voucher could incentivize students to leave public schools, shortchanging remaining students by leaving fewer dollars for costs like books & teachers because a higher proportion of funding wld be needed to cover fixed costs like heating & maintenance. @epi.org www.epi.org/publication/...

The national school voucher proposal in the Senate GOP reconciliation plan would threaten students’ access to quality public schools, give tax breaks to the wealthy, & override states that have rejected these harmful policies. Lawmakers who care about our kids’ futures should reject it.

Public education would be at especially high risk, given that it makes up the largest share of state budgets. For context: just the potential cost of the proposed 5% minimum SNAP match is the equivalent of average salary costs for about 65K public school teachers nationwide.

NEW REPORT: House Republicans’ budget reconciliation bill, now in the Senate, would shift major new costs to the state- & local-level, paving the way for harmful cuts to food assistance, health care, & other services like education. Here’s the 3 top things to know:🧵