Whose Priorities for Iowa?
On Jan 9th, Priorities for Iowa, a Super PAC claiming to be “an Iowa-based organization” announced a six-figure ad buy in support of Gov. Kim Reynolds’ school voucher program. The group claims to have the interests of Iowa parents at heart, but a brief look at their donor disclosures tells us otherwise. According to OpenSecrets.org, a nonpartisan nonprofit who tracks money in U.S. politics, in 2020 the largest donation to Priorities for Iowa, $750,000, came from billionaire hedge fund manager Kenneth C Griffin, founder of Miami, Florida-based hedge fund Citadel LLC. Griffin is one of the top 50 wealthiest individuals in the world today. Similarly, the largest donation of the 2022 election cycle came from the managing partner at Oak Hill Capital, a New York private equity firm.
By the end of the 2022 legislative session, the Republican majority in the Iowa House failed to pass legislation championed by the governor that would have created taxpayer-funded Education Savings Accounts to pay for private schools. When likely Iowa voters were asked in July 2022 , 71% of respondents, including a majority of self-identified Republicans, agreed that public schools need to be funded and protected to continue to serve their communities. Only 21% of respondents agreed that resources should be shifted to private alternatives. When asked specifically about state-funded scholarships to subsidize private school costs, 60% of respondents opposed them.
As an Iowa parent of public school children, I’m concerned about the outsized influence of out-of-state money on Iowa politics. I’m also wary of the interest that hedge funds and private equity firms have in desiring the tax dollars that educate all of our kids. Especially considering that as far back as 2016, the National Education Policy Center warned that “the charter industry as a whole is beginning to resemble a playground for private equity.” When it comes to turning a profit off of our children’s education, whose programs will be the first cut? Whose buildings will close?
I hope Iowans will be smart enough to think twice about whose interests are represented in the ads you’ll see this spring promoting the governor’s education bill. If you want to know who these voucher programs are made for and whose views on schooling are represented in the Iowa Statehouse, look no further than the New York and Florida hedge fund billionaires who plan on using our tax dollars to remake the Iowa education system in their image and for their profit.
Nick Covington is an Iowa parent who taught high school social studies for 10 years. He is also the co-founder of the Human Restoration Project, an Iowa educational non-profit promoting systems-based thinking and grassroots organizing in education.
