Ohio Attorney General: State will appeal school voucher ruling this week

COLUMBUS, Ohio (WCMH) -- Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost said the state will appeal a judge's decision on the EdChoice program this Wednesday.

In late June, a Franklin County judge ruled that Ohio's EdChoice program is unconstitutional. Joined by legislators and school choice advocates, Yost told reporters on Monday that the state is filing an appeal in the case this week. Even Judge Jaiza Page expected the appeal, as she stayed her own decision to minimize disruptions until appeals are finished. That means although the program is deemed unconstitutional, it is not subject to changes at this time, something Yost wanted to make clear. See previous coverage of this ruling in the video player above.

“EdChoice is the law of the land. It is funded, it is operational, it is available for Ohio parents,” Yost said.

The EdChoice voucher program is a state scholarship that allows any student in Ohio to receive at least a partial scholarship to attend a private or charter school. A coalition of advocates, parents and public school districts sued the state over the program, alleging it is unconstitutional on several counts. Page agreed with the coalition called Vouchers Hurt Ohio, and ruled that the state took money from public schools to fund the voucher program.

Yost and other school choice advocates disagree. State Rep. Jamie Callender (R-Concord) said that although advocates could have argued EdChoice takes public school funding previously, it is no longer true. Before 2022, the state would subtract funding directly from a school district for each student who used a voucher. After 2022, the state used a new school funding system, which considered public school funding and voucher funding separately.

Yost, Callender and other speakers rebutted much of Page's decision, arguing previous court cases set a solid precedent for them to win an appeal. They said an appeal is crucial to protect parents' right to choose how to educate their students.

“There’s hundreds of thousands of families that are depending on Attorney General Yost being successful in his arguments," School Choice Ohio President Yitz Frank said.

According to data from the Ohio Department of Education, about 130,000 students attended school on a voucher last year, and about one million students attended public schools.

Page also argued EdChoice involves direct payments to private religious schools with little or no state oversight, because parents can choose to spend their scholarships at religious schools. Religious attendance is very common with the EdChoice program; in the 2023-2024 school year, all of the top 100 schools with the highest enrollment of scholarship students were private religious schools. 

Yost and other speakers rebuked this, saying it is a parent's right to choose where they send their kids, and families are entitled to a religious education if they choose.

“If you’re going to have a school choice program, you cannot discriminate against kids because they choose a religious school,” Aaron Baer, president of the Center for Christian Virtue, said.

Speaker of the Ohio House Matt Huffman (R-Lima) even read from the Ohio Constitution at the news conference, pointing out a portion that says "religion, morality and knowledge" are essential to government, so the Ohio legislature is responsible for protecting the right to worship, and for "encouraging schools." He said the state is required by the Constitution to encourage religious schools through programs like EdChoice.

Vouchers Hurt Ohio strongly disagreed with Huffman's interpretation of the Constitution, pointing to another excerpt from the same section that says no Ohioan can be "compelled to" support any place of worship. They argue taxpayer dollars cannot legally be used to fund religious schools.

"Mr. Huffman is wrong and if he was a student in my high school history class, I would be compelled to give him an 'F' for a partial and misleading answer," Vouchers Hurt Ohio committee member and educator Dan Heintz said in a statement. "If lawmakers were compelled to fund religious schools for the past 150 years, why did it take them more than 110 years to get started?"

Despite Vouchers Hurt Ohio's criticism and initial legal success, Yost, Huffman and their fellow speakers felt confident they would win a future appeal. Yost is set to file his argument Wednesday.