This has been a week for executive branch fixation on vouchers. Here in Texas, in anticipation of Gov. Greg Abbott (R) declaring vouchers an emergency item in his upcoming State of the State address Sunday, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick (R) tasked the Senate Education Committee with fast-tracking Senate Bill (SB) 2, the Senate’s priority voucher bill. Meanwhile, at the federal level, President Donald Trump released a pair of executive orders: one aimed at directing federal dollars toward vouchers and the other at highlighting claims that public schools are “promoting radical indoctrination”—claims that many feel are primarily designed to justify shifting funding to voucher programs.

Trump’s school choice-focused order trumpets a cause Trump and his financial backers have championed for eight years and is being heralded as a significant victory for those advocating for greater access to taxpayer-funded private education. The order directs multiple agencies to facilitate potential redirection and use of federal funds for private schooling. The order directs the U.S. Department of Education to issue guidance on using federal funds for voucher programs. The order has left federal policy experts in and out of government scrambling to release preliminary guidance on how or, in some cases, if agencies can comply. Trump’s nominee for Secretary of Education, Linda McMahon, the president and CEO of World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE), has yet to be confirmed, adding further uncertainty as to how the department will ultimately respond. The Department of Defense is tasked with creating a plan to help military families use federal funds for private schools, while the Department of the Interior must do the same for families attending Bureau of Indian Education schools. Additionally, the Department of Health and Human Services has been directed to guide states on allocating funds for private or faith-based education. One primary question to be answered is to what degree the president, who is not in charge of federal appropriations, can redirect funding toward a purpose for which it was not designated. (Further complicating matters is Trump’s campaign pledge to dismantle the Department of Education.)

Although Texas is in the early stages of the 2025 legislative session and discussions about “school choice” are just heating up, several Republican-led states have already enacted such policies. By permitting federal dollars to support these programs, Trump’s actions could further energize the movement, but no one understands the implications of this new executive order and its impact on states or families. Public school advocates, including ATPE, argue that diverting taxpayer dollars from public to private schools will harm already dramatically underfunded public schools, especially in districts facing budget shortfalls and declining enrollment. In the short term, these programs have tended to lead to increased burden on local taxpayers as state funding is diverted. In the longer term, critics fear this could lead to the eventual collapse of public schools and greater inequities in education.

Trump’s other school-related executive order purports to address parental rights and ending discrimination. It directs federal agencies to ensure compliance with laws prohibiting discrimination in K-12 education and protecting parental rights by seeking to end funding for what it describes as “illegal and discriminatory treatment and indoctrination in K-12 schools, including based on gender ideology and discriminatory equity ideology.” (Abbott issued his own letter to state agency heads on related matters Thursday afternoon.)

The details of Trump’s “parental rights” executive order are perhaps even more unclear than the order promoting vouchers, but it is very clear the executive branches at both the state and federal levels are creating significant challenges in obtaining public education funding for Texas public school students.