Cooper Bows to Leftists (Again), Vetoes School Choice

RALEIGH – They helped thrust him into office using House Bill 2 as a vehicle, and Governor Roy Cooper has done little but be at their beck and call ever since. The activist Left continues to hold sway over the governor’s office, evident by his recent vetoing of legislation allowing charter schools to add students.

From the News & Observer‘s T. Keung Hui:

“Gov. Roy Cooper has vetoed a bill that would allow the state’s popular but low-performing virtual charter schools to add students, after two left-leaning groups urged him to reject the legislation.

State lawmakers passed a bill in July lifting the enrollment cap on the state’s two virtual charter schools so that they could grow by 20% a year. Cooper announced Monday that he had rejected Senate Bill 392, citing the schools’ poor academic performance. […]

Republicans lawmakers accused Cooper of not supporting school choice with the veto.

“Expanding these education opportunities for students enjoyed broad bipartisan support in the state House to help kids learn in a setting that works best for them,” House Speaker Tim Moore tweeted Monday. “The Governor is now blocking innovative learning as well as school construction and pay raises.”

Bill D’Elia, a spokesman for Senate leader Phil Berger, noted how 1 in 5 North Carolina students don’t attend traditional public schools.

“It’s disappointing that Governor Cooper continues to fight against empowering parents to put their children in an educational setting that best fits their needs,” D’Elia said in a statement. “As recent enrollment numbers show, more parents than ever are taking control of their child’s education, as parents, not politicians, should be the ones making these decisions.”

The Leftists leaning on Cooper to spike the bill are running protection for the public schools lobby, groups like the NCAE, that want to snuff out all education competition in order to force kids and their parents tax dollars into state controlled settings where narrative threads of social justice can be woven into their upbringing.

The education policies (more money, more top down control, workers-of-the-world unite) Cooper and the Democrats peddle belie their pro-education, pro-children, and fairness talking points.

Cooper says that the school isn’t performing well enough, so they can’t grow. What about from the perspective of parents and students that want to join the school, and aren’t allowed because of this arbitrary limit? Those looking for an innovative way out of their specific schooling situation undeniably overlap with the very factions Cooper is playing to.

We’ve said it before: If the anti-school choice crowd really wanted better for education, for students, they’d champion more choices for kids artificially corralled in education facilities that, for whatever reason, suppress their chances to excel.

You can read more about the bill and lawmaker reactions here.