Betsy DeVos calls $5 billion school tax credit plan ‘the conservative answer to what ails American education’ -- and says, incorrectly, that it won’t cost the government money

Trump adviser Kellyanne Conway participated in same event.

By Valerie Strauss
Oct. 1, 2019 at 7:36 p.m. EDT

Education Secretary Betsy DeVos, appearing Tuesday at a D.C. think tank with presidential adviser Kellyanne Conway, called her $5 billion federal tax credit plan that would fund scholarships to private and religious schools “the conservative answer to what ails American education.” And she said, incorrectly, that it won’t cost the government any money to implement.

DeVos and Conway appeared at the conservative American Enterprise Institute (see video below) for a discussion about the Trump administration’s Education Freedom Scholarships proposal. The scholarships would be funded by individuals and businesses who want to privately donate but who would then receive a federal tax credit for doing so.

President Trump’s 2020 budget plan includes $5 billion to pay for those tax credits, on a dollar-for-dollar basis: A dollar for a scholarship gets you a $1 tax credit. (The president’s budget proposal also would cut Education Department spending by nearly $9 billion. Congress is not expected to approve the tax credit program or the budget cuts.)

DeVos has been clear since becoming education secretary in 2017 that her chief priority was expanding alternatives to traditional public schools, which she once called “a dead end.” As she has in the past, DeVos on Tuesday hailed the proposal as one that would not take money away from public schools, and this time she said it wouldn’t use any “government money” — even though the $5 billion used to cover tax credits means government money would be involved.

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