Bob Schaffer: “in the State of Arizona, between 1998 and the year 2000, in the first 3 years since Arizona passed their tax credit…”

“in the State of Arizona, between 1998 and the year 2000, in the first 3 years since Arizona passed their tax credit language for education, that State raised over $30 million for schoolchildren in Arizona. These are new dollars. These were not dollars taken away from the existing public schools; these were new dollars that were infused into the education system, the overall system, the nondiscriminatory system of Arizona. Because today, when we talk about academic freedom and choice, these qualities of liberty are dispensed on a discriminatory basis. The wealthy get freedom, the children of the wealthy do. Those who happen to live in one of these unique States or neighborhoods where school choice is allowed to occur, they get freedom. But the vast majority of children, especially those who need it the most, are denied the freedom to go to the kinds of schools that they want. Not only that, but the administrators of the public schools have their hands tied behind their back because their ability to access these new funds are limited, and the tax credit proposal puts more money into the education system for private and public schools. It does not discriminate against children.”