The teachers’ unions and their allies at Save Our Schools (SOS) have proven time and time again that they will do anything to kill universal school choice in Arizona.
They’ve fought expansion of the program. They’ve pushed to cap it. They’ve worked with activist reporters in the legacy media with ties to the Red for Ed teachers’ union to push false claims about it. And we all witnessed it four years ago when they made their not-so-triumphant proclamation that they had enough signatures to repeal the program—only to discover they had miscounted by more than 50,000 signatures.
But their latest attempt to overturn the program is their lowest yet.
Earlier this month, the teachers’ unions and SOS announced they had submitted more than 420,000 signatures for a ballot initiative that would end the universal eligibility of Arizona’s Empowerment Scholarship Accounts (ESA) program.
Given their track record, the Arizona Free Enterprise Club worked closely with the Goldwater Institute and other school choice advocates to review the petitions. What we found was far more disturbing than another failed signature count.
Dozens of Convicted Felons—Including Registered Sex Offenders—Hired to Collect Signatures
The teachers’ unions and SOS want Arizonans to believe that their “Protect Education Act” campaign is a grassroots effort led by concerned parents and educators. But they made a very different choice when it came time to build their campaign…
Former Arizona Governor Doug Ducey is blasting the anti-ESA ballot measure, which is currently facing a legal challenge from the Arizona Free Enterprise Club and the Goldwater Institute. Under Ducey’s leadership, Arizona became the nation’s leader in school choice.
The Goldwater Institute filed a lawsuit earlier this week, challenging the validity of signatures submitted for the proposed “Protection Education, Accountability Now Act,” a ballot initiative that would place new restrictions on Arizona’s Empowerment Scholarship (ESA) program.
According to the lawsuit, the initiative required 255,949 valid signatures to qualify for the November ballot but allegedly submitted enough invalid signatures to fall below that threshold. It contends that tens of thousands of petition signatures are subject to disqualification and raises concerns about the campaign’s signature-gathering process.
Goldwater claimed that more than 75% of the signatures were collected by paid circulators rather than volunteers and questioned whether some petition circulators met legal standards.
Out-of-state special interests are spending millions to buy their way onto Arizona's ballot. Today, Goldwater filed suit challenging the invalid signatures submitted for this anti-school choice measure. We will keep fighting to defend the rights of Arizona families and protect…
— Goldwater Institute (@GoldwaterInst) July 20, 2026
Ducey criticized the proposed initiative, arguing that it would eliminate educational options for families participating in the ESA program.
“Once again, we are reminded how little these out-of-state unions care about Arizona students and their parents,” stated Ducey. “This measure would strip tens of thousands of Arizona families of educational choices they have made for their children, forcing students out of the schools that are serving them well and back into schools they chose to leave. That is unacceptable, and we will vigorously challenge this measure at every possible step.”
Arizona’s ESA program currently serves more than 100,000 students, allowing eligible families to use state education funds for private school tuition, homeschooling expenses, and other approved educational costs.
Supporters of the program argue it expands educational opportunities and parental choice, while opponents have raised concerns about its cost and oversight.
The Goldwater Institute alleged that the ballot initiative is backed by out-of-state special interest groups seeking to limit Arizona’s school choice program.
“This is a shameless attack on Arizona’s parents, funded by an out-of-state union,” said Victor Riches, President and CEO of the Goldwater Institute. “They’re trying to game the system by turning in tens of thousands of invalid signatures in an effort to destroy the most successful school choice program in the country. This won’t happen on our watch.”
The Arizona Free Enterprise Club announced that it joined the legal challenge in support of the Goldwater Institute’s lawsuit. Greg Blackie of the organization will serve as a plaintiff in the case.
They Claim to Protect Children. Look Who They Hired!!
Arizona Free Enterprise Club @azfec Joins Legal Challenge to Union-Backed Anti-ESA Initiative. Save Our Schools and the teachers unions claim their anti-ESA campaign is about protecting children.
— Arizona Free Enterprise Club (@azfec) July 21, 2026
According to the Arizona Free Enterprise Club, it worked alongside the Goldwater Institute and other school choice advocates to review petition signatures and identify what they describe as “serious irregularities”.
The organization said the complaint also raises concerns about individuals hired to circulate petitions, including allegations involving circulators with criminal histories.
Arizona Free Enterprise Club President Scot Mussi released a statement, saying election laws should be enforced equally for all ballot initiatives.
“Save Our Schools and the teachers unions have spent years accusing ESA families of fraud and demanding greater scrutiny of parents, said Mussi. “Now, their own campaign is facing serious questions about the people they hired to gather signatures. Arizona’s election laws must be fully enforced. If this campaign failed to collect enough lawful and valid signatures, it must not qualify for the ballot.”
The challenged initiative is backed by Save Our Schools Arizona, the Arizona Education Association, and other organizations that have, for years, supported additional limits on ESA eligibility.
Ethan Faverino is a reporter for AZ Free News. You can send him news tips using this link.
A teachers’ union-backed initiative to end Arizona’s universal school choice program relied on a variety of violent felons to collect signatures in violation of state law.
In what some critics have called a twist of irony, the initiative allegedly failed to conduct background checks on those gathering signatures for a reform that would require background checks for providers within the Empowerment Scholarship Account (ESA) program.
An amended complaint filed by the Goldwater Institute this week identified nearly 28,000 signatures collected by multiple felons, including a child predator, kidnapper, human trafficker, meth dealer, and killer.
In all, the Goldwater Institute estimated that these signatures, combined with all other invalid signatures, would render the petition ineligible for the November ballot. The Protect Education Act ballot initiative would need about 256,000 signatures at minimum to qualify.
One of the signature gatherers was Jess Redhorse, Jr., convicted of sexual abuse of a minor. According to a mandatory notice issued by the Flagstaff Police Department, Redhorse was convicted of sexual abuse of a minor in 2015 and released in October 2017 as a Level Two sex offender. Level Two signifies intermediate risk to the community. Redhorse’s victim was a 14-year-old female.
Redhorse is not listed on Arizona’s sex offender registry.
Per the Goldwater Institute complaint, Redhorse gathered more than 600 signatures for the petition.
Save Our Schools and the teachers unions say they are fighting to “protect” Arizona’s children.@NEAToday@ArizonaEA@arizona_sos
This is who their campaign trusted to collect signatures.
According to the verified complaint filed by the Goldwater Institute, Jess Redhorse Jr.… pic.twitter.com/NUecaSieoa
— Arizona Free Enterprise Club (@azfec) July 22, 2026
Other signature gatherers had violent felony-level criminal pasts as well according to the Goldwater Institute:
Dwight Perkins, Jr., was convicted of aggravated assault in Arizona and cocaine dealing in Illinois. Perkins gathered nearly 3,400 signatures.
Aaron Soto and Jose Roberto Valencia Toscano were convicted of trafficking illegal aliens for profit in Arizona. Soto gathered more than 3,100 signatures and Toscano gathered nearly 1,800 signatures.
According to a complaint filed with the Arizona District Court in 2023, Valencia Toscano trafficked illegal aliens using an unregistered vehicle in March 2023.
Freddie Wilkerson, Jr., was convicted of conspiracy to sell or transport marijuana in Arizona. Wilkerson gathered more than 2,900 signatures.
Alvin Harrison, Jr., was convicted of involuntary manslaughter in Nevada. Harrison gathered nearly 2,700 signatures.
News reports state that Harrison was convicted of manslaughter in the case of a slain security guard, Jose Parra. It appeared that Harrison robbed the man after he killed him, taking his watch and wedding ring.
Melvin Alston was convicted of attempted manslaughter in New York. Alston was included in the amended complaint but not included in the original complaint.
Mark Trusiak, Sr., was convicted on a drug paraphernalia-related felony in Arizona. Trusiak gathered more than 2,000 signatures.
Adam Lopez Milligan was convicted of assault, kidnapping, and weapons misconduct in Arizona. Milligan gathered more than 1,100 signatures.
Kisha Antoinetta Christian was convicted of importing methamphetamines in Arizona. Christian gathered more than 50 signatures. Christian was also convicted of trafficking illegal aliens in 2018.
Trevor Tatsuya Murphy was convicted of assault with a deadly weapon, unlawful taking of a vehicle, and trafficking stolen property in California. Murphy was not included in the original complaint.
A police department in California issued a press release in 2014 identifying Murphy as one half of a pair responsible for a series of thefts and vehicle burglaries that concluded with the pair striking a victim with a stolen vehicle while fleeing.
Robert Smith, Jr., was convicted of attempted murder, arson, stalking, criminal threats, and drug-related charges in California. Smith gathered two signatures.
Scott Simpson was convicted of felony drug offenses in Arizona. Simpson gathered about 100 signatures.
Jennifer Smith was convicted of drug possession in California. Smith was not included in the original complaint.
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A ballot initiative to end the state’s universal school choice program is facing a new challenge to the validity of its signatures.
The Goldwater Institute filed the challenge in court on Monday.
The Arizona Free Enterprise Club (AZFEC) also announced that it joined Goldwater’s legal challenge, with AZFEC Vice President of Policy Greg Blackie serving as a plaintiff in the case. According to AZFEC, it worked alongside Goldwater and other school choice advocates to review petition sheets, identify alleged irregularities, and help ensure Arizona’s ballot qualification laws are enforced.
The Goldwater Institute said “a large amount” of the more than 415,000 signatures submitted appeared to be “fallacious.” The initiative needs about 256,000 signatures to qualify for the November ballot. The complaint raised more than 73,300 objections; the complaint asserted that, with all signatures removed as a result of the objections, the ballot initiative would be left with fewer than 256,000 valid signatures.
The 900-page complaint filed in the Maricopa County Superior Court stated that the signatures weren’t properly registered with the secretary of state’s office as required by law.
Specifically, the complaint raised objections including paid but unregistered circulators, signatures gathered prior to circulator registration, false residential addresses, permanent address contradictions, bad telephone numbers or email addresses, false identities, bad service addresses, and ineligible, missing, or mismatched IDs.
Additionally, the Goldwater Institute claimed that certain circulators were ineligible to collect signatures because they had been convicted of a criminal offense involving fraud, forgery, or identity theft; convicted of another felony offense in which their civil rights haven’t been restored; or adjudicated an incapacitated person.
Individuals named as ineligible circulators were convicted of felonies and other crimes related to drugs, human trafficking, manslaughter, sexual abuse of a minor, assault, kidnapping, weapons misconduct, forgery, false reporting, and credit card forgery.
Finally, the complaint claimed that certain circulators failed to write their full and correct assigned circulator identification number on multiple petition sheets.
Arizona Free Enterprise Club President Scot Mussi said the allegations raised questions about the campaign’s vetting and oversight of paid petition circulators.
“Save Our Schools and the teachers unions have spent years accusing ESA families of fraud and demanding greater scrutiny of parents. Now, their own campaign is facing serious questions about the people they hired to gather signatures,” said Mussi. “Arizona’s election laws must be fully enforced. If this campaign failed to collect enough lawful and valid signatures, it must not qualify for the ballot.”
Goldwater Institute CEO and President Victor Riches criticized the initiative for its heavy sourcing of out-of-state special interest funding.
“This is a shameless attack on Arizona’s parents, funded by an out-of-state union,” said Riches. “They’re trying to game the system by turning in tens of thousands of invalid signatures in an effort to destroy the most successful school choice program in the country. This won’t happen on our watch.”
The Goldwater Institute also stated in a press release that the original title of the initiative was misleading.
If enough signatures are validated and voters approve the measure, the Protect Education Act would impose an income eligibility cap on the Empowerment Scholarship Account (ESA) program.
Doug Ducey, former Arizona governor, was quoted in the Goldwater Institute press release saying the entire effort to dismantle the ESA program proved the true intentions of teachers’ unions. Ducey signed the bill into law that made the ESA program open to all students.
“Once again, we are reminded how little these out of state unions care about Arizona students and their parents,” said Ducey. “This measure would strip tens of thousands of Arizona families of educational choices they have made for their children, forcing students out of the schools that are serving them well and back into schools they chose to leave. That is unacceptable, and we will vigorously challenge this measure at every possible step.”
In response to the submission of the ballot initiative signatures earlier this month, Ducey launched a political action committee to secure school choice accessibility for military families.
Protect Education, Accountability Now (PEAN), the organization behind the ballot initiative, filed a challenge last week to the competing legislature-referred ballot initiative that would negate their proposed ballot initiative.
Cecily Myart-Cruz, the immediate past president of United Teachers Los Angeles (UTLA), carried almost 70% of the vote, a signal that the NEA is likely to double down on its leftwing political power play and far-left social justice activism.
This is hardly breaking news. It reflects the union’s longstanding trajectory and echoes outgoing NEA President Becky Pringle’s recent call for a “political revolution.”
For decades, the teachers unions have built a political machine that channels members’ dues into political campaigns, activist organizations and ballot initiatives. Since 2016 alone, the NEA, AFT and their affiliates have directed more than $1 billion to political groups and activist organizations.
Despite the unions’ constant drumming on about protecting “democracy” from “fascists,” the virtue signaling is nothing more than cover for their Machiavellian-light tactics.
So, it should not come as a surprise that the NEA’s Representative Assembly (RA) just adopted a bylaw to increase yearly member dues by $10 to be directly “allocated to the Ballot Measure/Legislative Crises and Media Campaign Fund.” That means an additional $20 million per year will be injected into state and local politics to advance the NEA’s agenda.
To understand how this functions in practice, look to the current school choice fight in Arizona over the state’s Empowerment Scholarship Account (ESA) program. Through astroturf proxies, the NEA is attempting to stop or handicap Arizona families’ ability to choose the best school for their children.
Leading the current anti-school choice movement in The Grand Canyon State is Protect Education, Accountability Now, a recently registered Political Action Committee (PAC) that took in almost $4.5 million from the NEA in the first three months of 2026.
It is more than a union-funded PAC — it is run by union leadership. In fact, the chairman of the PAC, Delia Lynding, is the president of the Kyrene Education Association and a highly active union member. At a No Kings rally this past March, Lynding parroted national leadership rhetoric by declaring that the “unions are the antidote to fascism.”
Apparently, we do not share the same understanding or definition of “fascism.”
But this is not an isolated case of the unions wielding their collective power and resources to influence and control state and local policy and legislation. Over the last few years, the teachers unions have dumped tens of millions of dollars into activist nonprofits to stop or challenge school choice measures in states like Colorado, Kentucky, Maine and Nebraska.
Expanding this political hydra, the NEA has partnered with Public School Strong, an “organizing and visibility campaign of Race Forward’s HEAL Together initiative” that is headed up by a lead organizer with a lengthy history of antisemitic posts and statements. The initiative’s expressed purpose is to support “equity” and protect schools from the “rising tide of extremist attacks against public education” by training up students, parents, and community members as local activists for the union’s interests. In 2024, the NEA gave Race Forward over $300,0000.
At this year’s NEA annual meeting and assembly, the Representative Assembly has reaffirmed the future direction of the organization – the nation’s largest teachers union wants more power and control over schools and culture, and they are willing to use the education system to achieve it.
In order to thwart these efforts, we need to continue to expose their tactics and agenda to the public, offer up alternatives like the Teacher Freedom Alliance, and promote legislation that neuters and defunds this far-left political monstrosity.
It is way past time that we end the teachers unions’ professional activist funding pipeline.
Rhyen Staley is a contributor to The Daily Caller News Foundation and a researcher for Defending Education. He holds a master’s degree in elementary education and has over a decade of classroom experience in both public and private schools. He has over 25 years of coaching experience from junior high to Division I.
