Read on for news on primary ballot questions about the federal voucher program, dozens of advocacy groups calling on Gov. Pritzker to refuse vouchers for Illinois, and the latest on federal funding with public schools under siege due to federal immigration agents...

Thousands of bills are introduced in Springfield every session. Here's some of the bills that we are supporting or following closely during the spring 2026 session of the 104th IL General Assembly. 

Key bill we are supporting

Prohibit federal vouchers - SB 3966  This bill will prohibit Illinois' participation in the new federal voucher program created under HR 1, the One Big Beautiful Bill Act. 

Other bills we support

 Looking for our past legislative agendas? 2025- 104th GA, 2024 - 103rd GA, 2023 - 103rd GA, 2022 - 102nd GA, 2021 - 102nd GA; 2020 - 101st GA; 2019 - 101st GA; 2018 - 100th GA

A stealth referendum question about vouchers may be on your ballot on March 17th! Here's what to know:

Illinois law enables voters or lawmakers to add up to three non-binding questions (per political subdivision, e.g. county) on election ballots to be voted for or against. These are also known as advisory referenda or ballot measures. 

On March 17th, about 10% of Illinois voters will have a non-binding question on their primary ballot about whether Illinois should opt into the federal voucher program. You can check on this list to see if your county (or, in a few cases, your township) will have the ballot question.

Concerningly, the question is misleadingly worded (see details below). It implies that the program will not redirect public dollars to fund private schools and does not include the word voucher.

We urge all voters to vote NO on the question about the federal voucher program.

Share this fact sheet on the referenda.

Based on this news story, it looks like these stealth voucher ballot questions were coordinated by the Illinois Policy Institute, an ultra-conservative, anti-public school think tank funded by rightwing billionaires, including Charles Koch and Dick Uihlein. You can read more about IPI here.

The results of these ballot questions have no legal impact; the decision about whether Illinois joins the federal voucher program is up to Governor Pritzker and the General Assembly.

However, IPI and other voucher supporters are likely to use any favorable results as an indicator of public support for vouchers. 

Historically, vouchers have lost on the ballot every time voters have been asked to weigh in since 1970, including the 2024 general election, where voters in Kentucky and Nebraska soundly rejected them by about 2:1. Voucher proponents know that vouchers aren’t popular with voters, which explains the deceptive wording on this latest question, describing the program as a federal program that distributes private dollars:

Voters reading their ballot carefully may ask: why would you need a federal program to distribute private money? The answer is that the federal voucher program spends public dollars. It will divert billions of tax dollars from the US Treasury to fund mostly private education around the country. There is no limit on the size of the program in the statute, but estimates are upwards of $25 billion a year.

Because each of these advisory questions were approved by different jurisdictions, the wording may vary! Here's the wording on the Grundy County ballot for example:

More about the federal voucher program

The federal voucher program, set to begin in January 2027, is structured as a tax credit scholarship program, like Illinois’ now-defunct voucher program, known as “Invest in Kids.” Tax credit scholarship vouchers let taxpayers divert some portion of the taxes they owe to third-party “scholarship granting organizations” (SGOs). 

These SGOs then distribute the money as vouchers to pay for private school tuition and fees, mostly at religious schools. 

Regulations to implement the program are not yet finalized, but all indications thus far are that the SGO industry will be dominated by large multi-state organizations (e.g. a Florida SGO with ~$1B in revenue last year), with assistance from Betsy DeVos’ American Federation for Children, which has already seeded a $10 million fund for AFC to promote SGOs that align with it, in addition to creating its own SGO. 

The money given to SGOs would otherwise be collected as tax payments, and courts have ruled that legally these are public funds.

Voucher programs were created to fund private schools with tax dollars , and the federal one is likely to be no different—despite the fact that in theory some dollars could go to SGOs that distribute money for individual public school families’ expenses. The overall drain on public school budgets if even a small percentage of students leave for private schools will be in the hundreds of millions of dollars, far outweighing any revenue from SGOs to public school students.

Opting into the federal voucher program will undoubtedly and irreversibly erode Illinois' public school funding—which is why we urge all voters to vote NO on this ballot question to send a clear message: Illinois says NO to vouchers.

More resources

• “What to know about the new federal school voucher program” - IL-FPS's FAQ
• "The Federal Tax Credit Voucher Program: A Landscape of Risks for Public Schools and Students" - National Coalition for Public Education
• "The Federal Tax Credit Program is Not Offering Free Money for States" - National Coalition for Public Education
• "Vouchers hurt equity": Illinois had a voucher program in the form of a tax credit scholarship from 2018-2024. This 1-pager summarizes IL-FPS' research on how the program funded discrimination, not equity. More background on Illinois' voucher program here.

Today a coalition of organizations delivered a letter to Governor Pritzker calling on him to act on his values and commit to opting Illinois out of a new federal school voucher program championed by the Trump administration. Full press release below.

It's a new year on the calendar, but the fights to defend and improve our public schools continue. Read on for the latest news on the looming threat of the new federal voucher program and a potentially positive development for state school funding in Illinois...and action steps to take on both these issues.

The US Treasury Department and the IRS are now writing the regulations to implement the new federal voucher program and issued a request for comments from the public in November. Below you can read the comment that Illinois Families for Public Schools submitted.

Congress passed a massive new federal voucher program as part of the One, Big, Ugly Bill this summer. The language of the law falls under the Internal Revenue Code, so the US Treasury Department and the IRS are writing the regulations to implement the program and put out a request for comments from the public last month. Comments are due December 26, 2025. Read on for more background and info on how to submit your own comment.

Strong public schools that welcome and nurture every child benefit all of us. But, as you know, since January, the Trump administration has been engaged in a massive campaign to destroy our public school system, in line with a larger agenda of undermining the public good and the foundations of a democratic society, including the establishment of a brand new federal voucher program.

Strong public schools that welcome and nurture every child and young person benefit all of us. But, the Trump administration is engaged in a massive campaign to destroy our public school system—in line with their larger agenda of undermining the public good and the foundations of a democratic society.

There are multiple components to this campaign: dismantling the US Department of Education piece by piece in a series of mostly illegal moves, including firing staff, canceling grants and splitting up functions of the Department and assigning them to other federal agencies. It also includes the proposed massive cuts to federal K-12 funding, including the Title I dollars that support schools serving many children from low-income households.

Another key tactic in the attack on our public schools system: Expanding vouchers across the country. Congress approved Trump’s plan to create an unprecedented national voucher program back in July.

As it stands, every state has the option of saying NO to this program. Governors can refuse to have their state participate.

The governors of Oregon, New Mexico, Wisconsin and Hawaii have already said their states are opting out, and we need Governor Pritzker to make the same commitment.

Call Governor Pritzker's Springfield or Chicago offices. Here's a quick script you can use or adapt:

You can also leave a written comment for the Governor here.

Strong public schools that welcome and nurture every child and young person benefit all of us. And—because of that—public schools are one of the foundational institutions in our country that Trump and his anti-democratic lackeys are trying to destroy.

One method of destruction that Congress voted last month to roll out is a nationwide school voucher program.