Arizona families using the Empowerment Scholarship Account (ESA) program will no longer be required to submit curriculum documentation when purchasing general educational supplemental materials, such as basic school supplies, under a settlement agreement announced by the Goldwater Institute.
The agreement resolves a lawsuit brought by ESA parent Velia Aguirre against the State of Arizona, the Arizona Department of Education (ADE), and Superintendent Tom Horne over the documentation requirements.
The settlement, which took effect July 1, states that ESA families “shall not be required to submit a specific curriculum document” when purchasing items identified as “general educational supplemental materials” in the 2025–2026 ESA Handbook.
After pushing this bureaucratic abomination for 2 years, the office of Attorney General Kris Mayes has walked back its unlawful demands. No more permission slips needed to buy pencils and children's books:
The dispute began after Attorney General Kris Mayes’ office sent a 2024 letter to the ADE opening a public monies investigation into ESA spending approvals. The Attorney General’s Office said at the time that ADE guidance appeared to allow expenses beyond the statutory framework for the ESA program, including the approval of supplementary materials without documentation demonstrating a curricular connection.
In the letter, Mayes’ office asked the ADE to “promptly cease approving supplementary material expenses without the requisite documentation of a curriculum nexus,” and requested information on ESA spending for supplementary materials, curriculum materials, and textbooks from the 2019–2020 school year through the 2023–2024 school year.
The Goldwater Institute, which represented Aguirre, said in a September 2024 press release that the directive forced parents to justify purchases of basic school supplies and educational books. Goldwater said Aguirre had purchases such as “Where the Red Fern Grows,” a periodic table poster, and pencils rejected for failing to satisfy the curriculum documentation requirement.
Arizona law allows ESA funds to be used for several categories of educational expenses, including tuition at qualified schools, textbooks, tutoring, curricula, and supplementary materials.
The law defines “curriculum” as “a course of study for content areas or grade levels, including any supplemental materials required or recommended by the curriculum, approved by the department.”
After Mayes’ 2024 letter, the ADE posted guidance stating that supplementary materials, including common school supplies such as pencils, paper, glue, and crayons, required curriculum support. The ADE’s ESA support page stated that items previously allowed without curriculum documentation “now do require a curriculum.”
Goldwater filed suit in September 2024 on behalf of Aguirre and Rosemary McAtee, arguing that the documentation requirement imposed new burdens on families buying ordinary educational materials. Goldwater said at the time that parents were being required to show that each purchase was explicitly called for in a curriculum, including items such as pencils, erasers, flashcards, and children’s books.
Under the settlement, ESA families purchasing general educational supplemental materials must attest that the items are intended to support a curriculum or course of study for the qualified student and are not being purchased for another purpose. The agreement also requires ESA holders to indicate the curriculum or course of study the materials support by selecting categories such as reading or grammar, social studies, science, mathematics, physical education, art, vocational instruction, or other.
The agreement states that the ADE will not require a specific curriculum document as a prerequisite for approval or processing of general educational supplemental material purchases. It also provides that the ADE may require an ESA holder to enter the name of the curriculum or course of study in a text box when selecting “Other,” once technologically feasible or no later than the second quarter of fiscal year 2027.
The settlement does not eliminate the ADE’s oversight authority. Rather, it states that nothing limits the ADE’s ability to review or audit individual expenditures or ESA accounts, disallow expenses, seek repayment, or report an ESA holder to the Attorney General’s Office for investigation of fraud, misuse of funds, or unlawful expenditures.
The agreement also preserves the Attorney General’s authority to investigate or enforce the law in cases involving fraud, misuse of funds, or unlawful expenditures, and to request information in specific cases where there is a reasonable basis to believe a violation occurred.
The State disputed in the settlement agreement that the ADE enforced the alleged documentation policy and maintained that the ADE has the authority and obligation to confirm that ESA expenditures are allowable under statute and rules. The parties agreed to resolve the case to avoid the time, expense, and uncertainty of further litigation.
Goldwater characterized the settlement as a victory for ESA families.
“ESA holders shall not be required to submit a specific curriculum document when purchasing items identified as ‘general educational supplemental materials’ in the 2025–2026 ESA Handbook,” Goldwater wrote, quoting the settlement agreement. The organization said the change means families will no longer have to provide individualized curriculum documentation for ordinary educational purchases such as pencils and children’s books.
In a press release on July 2, Matt Beienburg, Director of Education Policy at the Goldwater Institute, summarized the legal victory:
“This means no more manufactured paperwork from parents simply to appease the bureaucratic whims of politicians. No more wasted hours explaining why hundreds of individual items, like pencils or children’s literature, are necessary for a child’s education.
“Instead, parents will simply acknowledge via a single check box for a purchase order or reimbursement request that the purchases are intended to support the course of study for an ESA student. What was once the needless compounding of minutes into hours to comply with the attorney general’s demands will now be two clicks of a mouse.”
The parties agreed to file a stipulation dismissing the case with prejudice within 10 days of executing the settlement.
A Goldwater Institute-backed measure to constitutionally protect Empowerment Scholarship Account (ESA) funds for children of military families will go before Arizona voters in November after receiving legislative approval.
House Concurrent Resolution 2048, sponsored by Rep. Michael Way (R-LD15), asks voters to amend Article XI of the Arizona Constitution by adding a new section prohibiting the state from confiscating money from certain scholarship accounts of students who are children of military families.
Under the resolution text, the prohibition would apply if the scholarship account is established and maintained by the state under a program that designates children of military families as eligible to receive scholarship money, and if the student may use the money for tuition or fees at eligible postsecondary educational institutions. The resolution states that the provision is not limited to scholarship account programs established and maintained by the state only for children of military families.
The measure defines a “child of a military family” as a student whose parent is serving on active duty in the U.S. Armed Forces, was serving on active duty when the student’s eligibility was initially determined, or was killed in the line of duty. The measure defines “confiscate” as seizing, transferring, or otherwise taking money from a scholarship account.
The resolution includes exceptions for closures of accounts tied to individualized findings of illegal activity or wrongdoing after due process. It also accounts for routine account closures, including voluntary closure or failure to renew an account, graduation from an eligible postsecondary institution, or loss of eligibility after a student fails to enroll in an eligible postsecondary institution for at least four consecutive years after graduating from high school.
HCR 2048 also states that if a bill enacted into law or a voter-approved measure on or after Nov. 1, 2026, violates the proposed constitutional provision, the entire bill or measure is void and a court may not sever any portion of it. The resolution directs the Secretary of State to submit the proposition to voters at the next general election.
The measure passed the Senate on June 12 by a 16-13-1 vote and passed the House on final reading June 13 by a 31-22-7 vote.
The Goldwater Institute described the measure as its “Military Family Protection Act” and said it is intended to protect military families participating in Arizona’s ESA program from future efforts to redirect or reclaim scholarship funds.
The Arizona Department of Education (AZED) currently lists 100,713 students enrolled in the ESA program this school year. The department’s Fiscal Year 2026 Quarter 1 report, covering July 1 through Sept. 30, 2025, counted 93,993 ESA students, including 975 students in the category for students whose parent is active-duty military or was killed in the line of duty.
Goldwater’s Director of Education Policy, Matt Beienburg, told lawmakers that military families should not lose scholarship funds through a separate ballot proposal aimed at the ESA program.
“There is a current ballot measure being proposed to attack the scholarship funds and confiscate the scholarship funds of children, including military families,” Beienburg said. “These families should not be treated as a piggy bank to raid. These are families who have protected this nation.”
Rep. Way said the measure is intended to prevent Arizona from reclaiming scholarship money after families were promised access to the program.
“This measure asks a very simple question: should Arizona be allowed to take scholarship money from military families after we promised them? My answer is no,” Way said.
The referral comes as opponents of the ESA program are circulating the Protect Education Act, a proposed ballot initiative that would impose new restrictions on the ESA program. The campaign says the measure would require background checks and safety standards for voucher-funded schools, add spending transparency rules, prohibit non-educational and luxury purchases, cap family income for ESA eligibility at $150,000 with annual inflation adjustments, require unused ESA funds to be returned, and require voucher-funded schools to be accredited or administer approved assessments. The campaign says students with disabilities would be exempt from the income cap and assessment provisions.
In an op-ed for AZ Free News, Matthew Ladner and Jason Bedrick of the Heritage Foundation wrote that AZED published the results of a random audit of the ESA program in March 2026, “finding very low rates of misspending relative to other publicly funded programs and even lower rates of fraud. Less than 2% of ESA funds were spent on unallowed items, and 0.3% of the funds were spent on items considered ‘egregious’ or fraudulent.”
AZED disputed claims that the ESA program had a 20% fraud rate in a March release, saying about 2.0% of dollars spent by ESA account holders were for items deemed unallowable under program rules and that actual fraud or egregious purchases accounted for 0.3%.
“The submission of a purchase that is deemed unallowable does not constitute fraud,” AZED said. “Most are innocent mistakes, such as an error in a form that must be resubmitted, or educational items that are not on the allowable list but that the user could have in good faith believed were permitted. Some examples would be backpacks, lunch boxes and water bottles.”
AZED said the 20% figure represented program participants selected for risk-based auditing and “had nothing to do with fraud.” The department said action is taken to recover or collect funds or refer matters to law enforcement when necessary, and that more than $1.2 million had been recovered through that process.
Opponents of HCR 2048 have argued that its voidability provision could invalidate ESA reform proposals if voters approve conflicting measures. ABC15 reported that critics said the measure is aimed at blocking the Protect Education Act, while supporters said it is intended to protect scholarship funds promised to military families.
HCR 2048 was one of three education-related ballot referrals approved before the Legislature adjourned. Senate Republicans said the measures were intended to protect military families, direct more education dollars into classrooms, and restrict the use of taxpayer-funded school resources for labor organization activities.
“These scholarship funds were created for helping the children of military families pursue higher education,” Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman David Farnsworth said. “When government faces budget pressures, dedicated funds can become tempting targets. Arizona should never balance its books on the backs of military families or treat money set aside for their children’s futures as a piggy bank.
“This referral permanently protects those funds and ensures they remain available for the students they were intended to serve.”
The Arizona Department of Education (ADE) accused a major media outlet of misrepresenting the amount of fraud that occurs within the state’s school choice program.
Per ADE, 12News claimed the Empowerment Scholarship Account (ESA) Program had fraud totaling 20 percent. ADE said this figure was false, and that the true fraud rate sits at 0.3 percent.
The 20 percent claim originated from a risk-based audit — an audit of limited scope — which targeted specific higher-risk participants and accounts. It does not account for the entire ESA Program population, says ADE.
ADE presented the 0.3 percent figure from a study by Stanford PhD on a random sample to obtain a more accurate assessment of the entire ESA population. That study, which reviewed 3,000 random ESA orders between July 2025 and February 2026, also concluded that unallowable spending amounted to less than two percent of the total.
ADE Superintendent Tom Horne demanded 12News issue a retraction.
“A ridiculous figure of 20 percent fraud has been circulating concerning ESA purchases which resulted from a total misinterpretation of data provided to Channel 12. The 20 percent figure represented program participants that ADE had selected for risk-based auditing,” said Horne in a press release. “Continued use of the 20% fraud allegation is an outrageous misrepresentation to the public that must stop.”
By comparison, Horne noted, other government programs have higher rates of improper spending: Medicaid totals over seven percent, food stamps total over nine percent, and unemployment insurance totals over 14 percent.
Horne clarified that the unallowable purchases rate doesn’t constitute fraud necessarily. The superintendent said “most” of those purchases were confirmed as “innocent mistakes” such as improper form completions or viewing certain unpermitted educational items as permitted, like backpacks or lunch boxes.
Horne said ADE promptly recovers misspent funds, and has recovered over $1.2 million.
The disputed 20 percent figure was mentioned in multiple articles by 12News, including one of the latest pieces of coverage published on Wednesday.
“According to state records obtained by 12News Investigates, nearly 20% of ESA parents or at least 18,000 ESA account holders, have misused voucher funds,” read Wednesday’s article.
The original 20 percent figure by 12News stemmed from a report on public records reviewed by the outlet which estimated that misspending “could” amount to 20 percent of all purchases in the ESA Program. The report stated that over 18,600 out of the 102,000 ESA account holders had at least one unallowable purchase over the course of a year.
Horne said at the time that the percentage provided wasn’t totally representative of fraud; rather, the superintendent said “most of it” was attributable to mistakes by the parents.
While critics of the program highlight the millions ADE is forced to recover, mainly from misspending and marginally from fraud, supporters of the program highlight the millions saved by children entering the ESA Program rather than their designated public district school system.
Goldwater Institute director of education policy, Matt Beienburg, said in a press release that wrongful spending occurs just as much, if not more, in the public school district system.
“It’s also worth observing that just 52 cents of every dollar sent to Arizona district schools now makes it to classroom instruction according to the state auditor general,” said Beienburg. “Among the many uses of those funds outside the classroom: a $500,000 trip to Las Vegas by a school district that promptly cut bus services for students; a district spending $4,000 per person to send staff to Napa, California for a conference featuring wine tastings, a district spending $18,500 on ‘membership dues and for staff to attend golf tournaments,’ and more.”
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On Tuesday, the Goldwater Institute announced a new initiative to educate lawmakers and students across the country and advocate for the resurrected concept of “federalism.”
Based upon its newly released report, “Federalism and State Constitutions: Model Language for ‘Tenth Amendments’ in State Constitutions,” Goldwater is launching a civics offensive to rekindle federalism in state governments, urging them to etch the spirit of the 10th Amendment directly into their own constitutions.
Dubbed the “Blueprint for Federalism,” the initiative from the group’s Van Sittert Center for Constitutional Advocacy was introduced with a policy report offering lawmakers a ready-made template: model language mirroring the U.S. Constitution’s reservation of powers to the states and the people. It’s a direct shot at the creeping centralization that’s turned America’s “laboratories of democracy” into mere outposts of Washington bureaucracy.
“America’s founders wisely recognized it from the beginning—the best chance for a sprawling young republic to survive would be for important political decisions to remain close to the people,” the Goldwater Institute declared in unveiling the plan.
Describing civic education as “in decline” and leaving generations adrift on the basics of our constitutional republic, the blueprint calls for states to put the measure on ballots starting in 2026, just ahead of the nation’s 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence.
Matt Beienburg wrote in a post to X, “What if Americans could stop fearing that every 4 years might usher in an over-powered president of the other party who will wreck the country? Whether you’re on the left or right, we already have the blueprint for empowering Americans rather than Washington D.C.”
The Goldwater Institute is proud to launch a new initiative to promote one of the core pillars of our republic, the Tenth Amendment, to statehouses and schoolrooms across the country.
As federal overreach swelled vastly under the Biden administration, including mandates on everything from education to energy, states like Arizona have already led the charge, making the legislature fertile ground for Goldwater’s initiative. Back in 2014, Arizona voters approved a constitutional tweak affirming the U.S. Constitution’s supremacy and barring state resources from propping up unconstitutional federal acts. It’s one of nearly a dozen states with similar guardrails, from Massachusetts’ 1780 original to Louisiana’s 1998 update.
Co-authors Matt Beienburg, director of education policy at Goldwater, and Sean Beienburg, an associate professor at Arizona State University’s School of Civic and Economic Thought and Leadership, lay out the playbook in the report. The core text proposed for state constitutions is a near-verbatim nod to the U.S. Constitution’s Tenth Amendment: “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”
In full, the proposed language reads:
“The Constitution of the United States is the supreme law of the land to which all government, state and federal, is subject.
The government of the United States is a government of enumerated powers, and all powers not delegated to it, nor inhibited to the states, are reserved to the states or to the people thereof.
Among the sovereign powers so reserved to the states is the exclusive regulation of their own internal government; but the people’s retained right of local self-government should be exercised in pursuance of law and consistently with the Constitution of the United States.”
The blueprint goes even further, though, pitching add-ons like explicit vows to uphold federal supremacy and rejecting funding for D.C. edicts that trample state sovereignty. It’s nonpartisan ammo, aimed at red strongholds and blue bastions alike, to spark a public awakening on where power truly belongs.
The Goldwater Institute has notched over 400 wins across all 50 states, including more than 50 policy and litigation triumphs in 2024 alone. This latest salvo fits their 2025 battle plan, as reported by AZ Free News: dismantling DEI indoctrination in universities, slashing government meddling in property, water rights, and healthcare, shielding parental rights in schools, and addressingunconstitutional tax hikes.
In the report, the authors push for a 2026 ballot blitz to “recommit legislative bodies to the principle of federalism” and ignite a nationwide conversation on the republic’s blueprint. The Goldwater Institute has the full model language for state constitutions and a deeper dive available online.
Responding to a letter issued by Arizona Democrat Attorney General Kris Mayes, Arizona Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Horne issued a statement that Mayes is “misleading the public with claims she has leveled at the management of the Empowerment Scholarship Account (ESA) program.” In an 8-page letter with 12 pages of testimony from the Arizona Department of Education’s John Ward in the case of Velia Aguirre v. State of Arizona, Mayes outlined an investigation from her office, making allegations regarding the Department of Education’s use of a risk-based audit approach, which echoes a similar exchange between Horne and Governor Katie Hobbs in December 2024.
Mayes directly critiqued Horne and the ADE writing in part:
“Your failure to appropriately monitor ESA spending has created an untenable situation. Again, I do not want to disrupt the process for ESA holders who are following the law, but this cannot continue. Accordingly, you must act immediately to develop and implement appropriately rigorous purchase review standards and risk-based audit procedures so that ESA families may access their funds in a timely manner and public funds are not spent illegally. The Department’s purchase review and audit standards should employ appropriate controls to safeguard public funds. These controls, and any automatic payment thresholds, should consider the level of risk associated with different categories of expenses, vendors, methods of payment, and individual ESA holders.”
Mayes went on to cite a 12 News report that “the Department has automatically approved [$]1.2 million ESA purchases since the automatic approval policy took effect in December 2024.”
As Matt Beienburg wrote in an op-ed for AZ Free News, the Arizona Capitol Times issued a retraction of its initial report that “Education department under fire for approving $124M in improper ESA [education savings account] purchases,” clarifying with a formal correction that “an inaccurate dollar amount,” was reported. However, no similar retraction has been issued by 12 News as of this report.
"Facts don't lie, even if the media does."
Here are two MAJOR lies 12News "reported" in its bogus ESA attack 👇
❌ Dollar amounts were exaggerated up to 100 times!
Beienburg notes that blatantly inappropriate purchases such as iPhones, televisions, and other non-educational items “haven’t been approved, as the State Board of Education’s ESA Handbook—ratified by members appointed by both former Gov. Doug Ducey and Gov. Katie Hobbs—makes clear. The document expressly states that while families’ ESA purchases under $2,000 are promptly reimbursed by the state, these items ‘are not deemed ‘approved’ by the Department, until they are audited OR the timeframe to audit the orders has passed [2 fiscal years].’ Just like their tax returns filed with the IRS, these families’ ESA purchases are processed up front and subject to enforcement afterwards.”
For immediate release: August 29, 2025 Horne calls out AG Mayes for misleading attack on ESA program AG sent letter to Superintendent today Link: : https://t.co/ul3JSKLudp Contact: Communications@azed.gov pic.twitter.com/xGEPdsrHqB
— Arizona Department of Education (@azedschools) August 29, 2025
In a lengthy statement, Horne addressed the allegations raised by Mayes and accused the AG of making false statements:
“In your letter today, and in a recent television interview, you misled the public by stating that improper ESA purchases had been approved, without any reference to the fact that under risk-based auditing dictated by the legislature the money has been recovered or is in the process of being recovered. We have collected or are in the process of collecting more than $600,000 that was paid out for improper purchases. You also criticize risk-based auditing. Risk-based auditing is a very common and appropriate practice used by auditors, and the ESA Director has more than 16 years’ experience as an auditor. The risk-based approach involves not approving purchases prior to review, but paying amounts under $2,000 subject to later review, which is how we were able to collect or be in the process of collecting more than $600,000.”
He went on to chide Mayes writing, “You state that this is not partisan. That is disproved by all the false statements you made on the television interview.”
Horne continued, “Your argument is not with me but with the legislature. The legislature recently passed ARS section 15–2403B. It provides in part: ‘The department, in consultation with the office of the auditor general, shall develop risk-based auditing procedures for audits conducted pursuing to this subsection.’
“The statute was passed because the department is operating with the same number of people to check purchases as had been given by the legislature when the program was 1/7th as large. The most recent House budget included an appropriation for more people to check purchases, but it had to drop that provision when the governor said that if it did not do so, she would veto the entire budget. The limit on personnel had meant delays for reimbursement or more than two months, which was an unbearable burden for parents who had already paid the money and needed reimbursement. This explains why the legislature wanted to add more staff to serve parents.
“Again, you misled the public in your interview by stating that these improper items have been approved. They were not approved, and as to all the items you mentioned, the accounts have already been frozen. This is as egregious as ignoring the recovery of over $600,000, not to mention your failure to state that this procedure was dictated to us by the legislature and the ESA parent committee that you referred to set the limit at $2,000 pursuant to the legislative command to adopt risk-based auditing. It has been made clear to ESA users in multiple communications that payments of under $2,000 do not imply approval, which can be obtained only after the risk-based auditing dictated by the legislature.
“You referred to a July 21 meeting of the legislative audit committee. Within four days we consulted with the auditor general. Some have erroneously interpreted the word ‘consultation’ to mean that the auditor general has the right to dictate terms to us. That is incorrect. The normal English language use of the word consultation is that we have a discussion, which we have done, and then proceed. However, we have agreed to have further consultations with the auditor general and will do so.
“We will provide at a later date further responses to your long-winded letter of seven pages single space. We are responding now to the main points so you will have no further excuse to mislead the public.”
