Good day, CharterFolk.
Let’s pick up where I left off on Thursday with the rest of this year’s elections debrief.
The Shift Within the Non-Shift
I start with numbers that I find striking.
They come from the National Conference of State Legislators.
NCSL cites the decreasing numbers of legislative chambers that are flipping in recent elections. Prior to 2012, the conference reports, the country had averaged a dozen flips per cycle going back 125 years. For a few elections it hovered around eight or nine. In the most recent, it’s been even fewer. This cycle, there were five, with three happening in Puerto Rico and Guam. In terms of states, the only changes were in Michigan …
… and Minnesota …
… where Republicans flipped and achieved a tie in Houses and disrupted Democratic trifectas.
In Michigan, it’s led to a mad-dash, lame-duck session to push though nine attack bills against charter schools, toxically and deceptively labelled “accountability” and “transparency” legislation as charter school attack bills nearly always are.
It’s the desperate flail of a dying status quo.
Rather emblematic, wouldn’t you say, CharterFolk?
Some national press has focused on Republicans making progress in statehouses, achieving super-majorities in some chambers and eliminating Democratic super-majorities in a few others, but what I find more striking is the level of stasis in party representation we find prevailing in legislatures.
Here are the numbers as NCSL has compiled them.
They show a .25% increase in the number of Republican state legislators, no increase in control of chambers, no increase in governors, and a decrease in states where they have a trifecta. And while Democrats have seen some losses, I wouldn’t call these results seismic like many are calling the presidential election.
What may be more important are the potential changes that didn’t happen.
Both chambers of the Arizona legislature, for example, remained under Republican control.
So, rather than the fate of the country’s first universal voucher program being in the hands of a Democratic trifecta, it remains controlled by those who made the program in the first place.
Pennsylvania is also interesting in terms of the change that didn’t happen. Though the state swung decisively Republican at the top of the ticket, Democrats retained their one-vote majority in the House …
… preventing the emergence of what could have been a fascinating set-up related to school choice: both chambers of the legislature controlled by Republicans and a Democratic governor who is a national outlier in his party in terms of support for private school choice.
For me, the more interesting dynamics to be keyed into right now are the shifts that are happening within the Republican and Democratic parties.
Both have shifted to be more conservative.
California is case in point.
Yes, San Francisco’s new mayor calls himself a Democrat, but the degree to which his policy positions differ from others in his party is a shock to the system.
It happens in the same place where the meltdown in public education is as bad as we find anywhere in the country.
This cycle, Trump won 38% of votes in California, whereas he won only 31% in 2016, and it looks like Republicans will add two members each to the state senate and assembly. But the biggest shift in the statehouse will result from many moderate Democrats winning legislative seats …
… all of whom are strong supporters of charter schools, providing our movement a level of backing in the legislature reminiscent of what we had before Gavin Newsom became governor.
In Texas, similar dynamics are at play.
Yes, the Republicans did pick up another couple seats in the Texas House and one in the Texas Senate in the general election, further strengthening Governor Abbot’s support for ESA legislation, which he has made one of his top priorities.
But the real news was not the three wins he had last week, but the nine he had in the primary taking out resistant Republicans …
… and the six more he took out in the May run-offs.
It speaks to that, short of the seismic changes happening at a presidential level, perhaps the greatest power shift happening in the country right now is occurring within the Republican and Democratic parties.
It’s the shift that has happened within the non-shift.
Reds Conforming While Blues Fracture
It wasn’t so long ago when Dems were united behind a shared agenda. A year and a half ago in Michigan, they pushed through in a single day sweeping legislation on a wide host of issues.
Republicans, meanwhile, were all over the place.
Even when they had control of legislative bodies their infighting led to utter dysfunction.
Now, the tables are turned.
Republicans are jumping three feet high behind an agenda as lockstep as we have seen in a generation.
The previously ungovernable are conforming.
And Dems are now the ones who are fractured.
Their elected ranks are people by many who do not conform to the NEA orthodoxy, including the new Governor of Delaware who is a former charter school teacher.
It creates a moment of enormous opportunity for the national charter school movement.
The Starlee Play
If there is anything we should take from the charter school world’s involvement in elections this cycle, it is that we are better prepared to take advantage of such an opportunity than we ever have been before.
I start with the work of the National Alliance’s political entities.
As CharterFolk know, I have been delighted bv the Alliance’s decision to hire Starlee Coleman as its new CEO.
My excitement grows out of having been an up-close observer of the great progress Starlee made leading the Texas association. Indeed, I framed the article I wrote for Education Next last year …
… around the headway charter schools have made in Texas, led by Starlee’s effort to evolve the association into a potent 501c3/c4 tandem able to be involved in high stakes political races.
There is no greater testament to the strengthening that Starlee catalyzed in Texas than the results that Charter Schools Now, the 501c4 partner to the Texas Charter Public Schools Association, had in last week’s elections. Now led by Natalie Kaharick on the C3 side, and Chelbi Mims on the C4 side …
… the association continued running “The Starlee Play” in the 2024 cycle, winning close legislative races, supporting both Republicans …
… and Democrats …
… in races where the charter school base is large enough to be difference making, with special priority going to races having high bearing on charter school matters, including state board of education races.
Meanwhile, Starlee brought the same play to a federal level, partnering with Will Burns …
… at the national Charter Schools Action Fund …
… to support both Republicans …
… and Democrats …
… who prevailed in a number of very close elections.
In all, the Action Fund went in behind three Republicans and three Democrats, winning five, and showing that charter schools can make a big difference in races that are too close to call in districts where the charter school base is large enough to be potentially difference-making.
It’s a play that is now spreading across the nation.
Colorado ran it nearly to a tee this year, with the Colorado League of Charter Schools Action, led by Dan Schaller and Kyle DeBeer …
… winning a closely contested state board of education race …
… maintaining the board’s one-vote support margin for charter schools, where the difference in vote count was a fraction of the number of registered voters connected to charter schools in the district.
And just as Starlee and Will prioritized super close congressional races for charter school difference-making, so too did CLCS Action prioritize close races in Colorado’s House …
… ultimately going two for three as they supported challengers taking on Democratic incumbents who have been among a group of state legislators attempting to inflict massive harm on charter schools in recent years.
It wasn’t so long ago, CharterFolk, that opponents of charter schools were running literally uncontested.
But now that charter school associations are evolving into C3/C4 tandems, like the association in DC led by Ariel Johnson and Belén Mendoza …
… those very same charter-hostile candidates are not only being contested.
They are being beaten.
Decisively!
And Ariel, like Starlee, is showing that the capacity to generate such results can be replicated across geographies. She previously helped INCS Action in Illinois grow into a political powerhouse.
Last week, INCS Action, now led by longtime CEO Andrew Broy and newcomer Lori Turner …
… had perhaps its most significant wins ever …
… helping ensure that six out of nine school board candidates endorsed by the Chicago Teacher Union went down to defeat …
… amplifying the national narrative coming out of Chicago right now that school district management being controlled by status quo interests leads to turmoil and dysfunction, adversely affecting the lives of thousands of students and families.
This is what is within our potential now, CharterFolk. Working strategically where we have the heft and sophistication needed to be difference-making, we can win races important enough to profoundly affect the entire national narrative regarding public education.
And at a moment when one of our nation’s major parties is going through a level of soul searching deep enough to affect its agenda for decades to come, there’s never been a more important time for our movement to redouble efforts to build political infrastructure than right now.
30X30X30
So, if we were to sum up election results for this cycle, we would report that, in many places across the country charter schools have won new support. And while it is true that we didn’t win every election this time around, including a heartbreaker in LA …
… it is also true that there are many policy-making contexts that are now significantly better for charter schools, and I can find virtually no contexts where things have become worse.
Part of this is due to larger trends that were outside our control, but a big part also – a part bigger than any prior electoral cycle – is due to our own efforts.
It can be easy to lose sight of these patterns unless you stay keyed into dynamics playing out below the surface.
Thus this debrief.
Long time CharterFolk readers know that I’ve been writing election takeaways for several cycles now where I have implored our world to “get in the game.”
I stand by that.
But this time around I realize that the imploring should be more specific – not just to “get in the game,” but to “run the play.”
Granted, it may not be entirely accurate to call it “The Starlee Play.”
Dynamic duos like Myrna Castrejón and Gregory McGinity …
… have been running the play at places like CCSA Advocates for years, helping charter schools achieve new levels of political support like they did again this cycle.
But it’s a play whose time has come at whole new levels, and it happens to occur right at the moment when we have a new leader at our national organization who has run the play successfully herself at a state level, has now run it successfully at a federal level, and is well-prepared to help many other organizations develop similar capacities across the United States.
So while she may object to the name, and if she tells me to cool it in the future I certainly will, but for now, call it:
“The Starlee Play.”
Working strategically on the margins.
Focusing on close elections where the size of the charter school base is large enough to be difference-making.
Supporting candidates from both sides of the aisle.
Getting great at turning out the charter school base.
Choosing races with high levels of impact on charter schools.
Doing so in synch with other efforts having enough leverage to change the narrative.
It doesn’t have to be a huge number of races. Starlee chose just six this time around.
But CharterFolk, imagine the impact we would be having if every state in the country had a dynamic duo running The Starlee Play in just six legislative races.
It would be enough to rewrite the discussion in this country, and to cultivate a faction of supporters within the Democratic Party large enough to bring the entire party back to its historical roots of support for our movement, all while continuing to respect the Republican Party that has grown stronger for us over time.
It’s why I ask you all, CharterFolk:
Go to your state association and ask what you can be doing to help bring The Starlee Play to your state.
For nearly five years now, I have been calling for 25X25X25.
Twenty-five state associations receiving twenty-five dollars per student in membership dues to support advocacy by 2025.
That goal is still massively important, but the time has come to be even more ambitious.
So I hereby issue the call for 30x30x30.
Thirty states with state associations having dynamic duos investing at least $30k/cycle in state legislative races by 2030.
It’s “The Starlee Play.”
And it’s an idea whose time has definitely come.