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It’s Petition Round Up Weekend! 🤠
This weekend is Protect Education’s May Petition Round Up Weekend [[link removed]] from Friday, May 8 - Monday, May 11 — and we want it to be HUGE! Our volunteers were on 🔥 bringing in nearly 1000 petitions during our last turn-in weekend, and we need y’all to do it again! [link removed] [[link removed]]
Do you have petitions with signatures on hand? Yeehaw, get ‘em turned in! No matter how full your sheet is, we are asking every volunteer to return as many petition sheets as you can so we can get an accurate count. We currently have 8,000 (‼️) petitions checked out to volunteers in the field, and we need as many back as possible — don’t fret, we’ll give you some more blanks once you do 😉 Let’s do this, Arizona. For our students, for our educators, for our future!
All of the statewide turn-in events listed here have a notary [[link removed]] to make turning in your petitions easy for you. There will be return events in every corner of Arizona — please check here to find a location near you (and of course you can also bring friends and family to sign and check out new petitions!) 👉 bit.ly/pe-roundup
📋 8 Weekends Left! We have just 8 weekends left to collect 256,000 signatures from Arizona voters to qualify the Protect Education Act [[link removed]] for the November 2026 ballot. We are going to rein in AZ’s $1 billion ESA voucher program and redirect saved funding back to Arizona’s public school classrooms — which serve over 90% of Arizona students 🍎🏫🎒
💥 Need more petitions, or ready to get started??? Here’s how to plug in:
* Pick up petitions at a Depot near you – here’s the Petition Depot list [[link removed]]
* Request petitions and get connected locally - here’s the Petition Request form [[link removed]]
* Here is the training video. [[link removed]] It’s critical that everyone who circulates watches it, no matter how many times you’ve volunteered for petitions. The rules change frequently, and we want all signatures you collect to be counted.
💥 Volunteer Resource Hub: Check out our Volunteer Hub [[link removed]] , which is your one-stop shop for all circulator trainings, FAQs, and more. Make sure to bookmark or save the link! 📌
READ THE FULL WEEKLY EDUCATION REPORT HERE [[link removed]]
LEA EL SEMANARIO EN ESPAÑOL [[link removed]]
Reject Federal Vouchers
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🔥 Here’s an excerpt of our newly published OpEd – read the whole piece here [[link removed]] :
“Are you tired of hearing reports about millions misspent on voucher-funded Disneyland trips, appliances [[link removed]] and lingerie [[link removed]] ? Well, if Arizona Republicans at the state legislature have their way, get ready for a whole lot more stories of voucher waste, fraud and abuse.
This week, Republican lawmakers pushed through an irresponsible, non-negotiated budget (which Gov. Katie Hobbs promptly vetoed [[link removed]] ) that would have forced Arizona to opt in to Trump’s federal voucher scheme [[link removed]] . This nationalized voucher scheme would trigger a massive transfer of wealth to Arizona’s private schools — the same ones already cashing in on our state’s $1 billion universal ESA voucher program — without any guardrails or protections against fraud or discrimination.
Opting in would double down on the massively inequitable, two-tiered system of haves and have-nots [[link removed]] that’s been pushed into Arizona with universal ESA vouchers, which have become a “handout for the wealthy.” It incentivizes disinvestment in — and therefore the dismantling of — public schools, which serve over 90% of Arizona students.
And as U.S. Sen. Mark Kelly, who recently introduced a bill to rescind the federal voucher scam, points out, this program is set to irresponsibly explode the federal debt by $25 to $55 billion a year. [[link removed]]
Republicans are the party of fiscal responsibility? Not anymore...
We won’t hold our breath waiting for the Trump administration to ensure the program doesn’t just serve as a tax shelter for the uber-rich [[link removed]] — but we do know that these guidelines won’t be issued until after our state budget has passed and the legislative session has concluded.
That makes opting in this year not just reckless behavior, but downright political malpractice…
Arizonans deserve a responsibly crafted budget that doesn’t contain poison pill voucher programs that are wide open for waste, fraud and abuse. Arizonans deserve politicians who are honest with the people and who prioritize proper funding of our public schools so students are equipped for their future. And Arizonans deserve leaders who will stand strong against federal tax cuts that benefit the wealthy when Arizonans are struggling to make en ds meet.”
SPEAK UP NOW - NO FEDERAL VOUCHERS [[link removed]]
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DONATE [[link removed]]
Legislative Update
⚰️ Another budget bites the dust: In what is unfortunately becoming an annual exercise, this week Hobbs promptly vetoed [[link removed]] the non-negotiated budget Republican legislative leaders sent her. She blasted it [[link removed]] as “unbalanced and reckless,” then invited the House and Senate to set up a budget meeting. She told KTAR [[link removed]] she and Republican negotiators met Thursday, and that she hopes talks will eventually be productive. We’re glad to see them meeting, as prior to this, Republican leaders were spending most of their time finger-pointing [[link removed]] and slinging accusations [[link removed]] .
🏖️ Must be nice: The Arizona Legislature has decided to take a paid vacation for the rest of the month. The House voted along party lines to skip town until June 1 [[link removed]] , saying there is currently nothing else for them to do (⁉️). The Senate will convene again on Monday, but plans to take the rest of May off as well. The governor’s bill signing moratorium [[link removed]] remains in effect until Republican legislative leaders participate in “good faith” budget negotiations, but is effectively moot with both chambers adjourned.
🙄 Wanting it all: Senate President Warren Petersen (R-14) said Hobbs shouldn’t expect major changes [[link removed]] from negotiations, but that’s not realistic. Republicans are insisting on having it all: full $1.4 billion tax conformity, massive cuts to SNAP and Medicaid, across-the-board agency cuts, and zero reforms to their $1 billion universal ESA voucher scheme. They’re also betting that Hobbs will wholly capitulate to their demands rather than risk a government shutdown — but, as the Arizona Agenda notes [[link removed]] , “Negotiating with the governor is a thing you have to do when the governor’s signature is required.” The Agenda also points out that Republicans’ “performative budget standoff didn’t work out well” last year.
Veruca Salt says [[link removed]]
⏰ Tick tock: The calendar is counting down toward lawmakers’ only constitutionally mandated responsibility: the passage of a state budget by midnight on June 30. Here’s hoping the approaching deadline lights a fire under our do-nothing legislative majority!
🤓✅ The SOSAZ 2026 Bill Tracker [[link removed]] , a live document with full information about all bills SOSAZ supports or opposes in 2026, gives you up-to-the-minute information on where these bills stand. Bookmark the Bill Tracker [[link removed]] to stay in the know.
Must-Attend Events!
Join Public Funds Public Schools on Tuesday, May 12, at 11am AZ time (2 pm ET) for a timely webinar [[link removed]] on Trump’s federal school voucher scheme.
With the program projected to funnel tens of billions of federal tax dollars through SGOs to vouchers, this webinar will highlight how these organizations have repeatedly been shown to lack adequate accountability and transparency leading to significant waste, fraud, and abuse of public funds.
Register now for No Accountability, No Transparency: The Risks of Scholarship Granting Organizations under the Federal Voucher Program [[link removed]] on May 12 at 11am AZ time (2 pm ET).
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Subscribe to Substack!
[link removed] [[link removed]] Our newsletters don’t write themselves! Support our work by becoming a paid subscriber to Save Our Schools Arizona’s Substack [[link removed]] . A monthly or annual donation of any amount helps to keep the lights on at the Weekly Education Report so we can provide you with the latest news in education week after week.
SUBSCRIBE HERE [[link removed]]
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Contact Us
[email protected]
Save Our Schools Arizona
PO Box 28370
Tempe, AZ 85285
United States
Paid for by Save Our Schools Arizona. Not authorized by any candidate.
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