{"id":465574,"date":"2026-10-14T07:56:16","date_gmt":"2026-10-14T07:56:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/465574\/"},"modified":"2026-10-14T07:56:16","modified_gmt":"2026-10-14T07:56:16","slug":"lahood-struggles-to-defend-school-voucher-rollout-in-hd121-race","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/465574\/","title":{"rendered":"LaHood struggles to defend school voucher rollout in HD121 race"},"content":{"rendered":"

State Rep. Marc LaHood<\/a> (R-San Antonio) walked into the lion\u2019s den on Tuesday.<\/p>\n

LaHood was among the roughly dozen Republicans<\/a> who Gov. Greg Abbott backed over popular GOP incumbents who stood in the way of the governor\u2019s much-desired school voucher program two years ago.<\/p>\n

Now that early reports on Texas Education Savings Accounts paint an unflattering picture<\/a> of their success, the first-term lawmaker is struggling to defend them in his first reelection race.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf the ESA program is a bust, I\u2019ll be the first to admit. \u2018Hey, I was wrong. How do we fix it?’\u201d LaHood told a crowd of about three dozen NEISD parents on Tuesday. \u201cI want to fix things, and transparency is how we get there. But that applies to both sides.\u201d<\/p>\n

Texas House District 121<\/a> on San Antonio\u2019s North Side hasn\u2019t elected a Democrat since 1981, but LaHood is now in a fiercely contested reelection race against Democrat Zack Dunn<\/a>, who is getting help from state and national Democrats.<\/p>\n

The only general election debate of that race was held Tuesday, hosted by North East ISD Council of PTAs and Raise Your Hand Texas at the Piper Bass Memorial Student Center, where nearly all of the questions were about school vouchers.<\/p>\n

\u201cI could not be more anti-ESAs, anti-voucher scams,\u201d Dunn said at the debate. \u201cThis is a billion dollars that was taken away from our public education system, and it was given to private institutions.\u201d<\/p>\n

North East ISD has identified 16 schools<\/a> that it could close in the wake of dropping enrollment and lack of funding, and Dunn and LaHood \u2014 a prosecutor and criminal defense attorney, respectively \u2014 paced the podium area with their passionate takes.<\/p>\n

Afterward the debate, NEISD leaders and PTA organizers said they were stunned by some of LaHood\u2019s comments.<\/p>\n

\"\"State Rep. Marc LaHood (R-San Antonio) speaks at a HD121 forum hosted by North East ISD Council of PTAs, in partnership with Raise Your Hand Texas, on Tuesday, Oct. 13, at the Piper Bass Memorial Student Center. Credit: Andrea Drusch \/ San Antonio Report<\/p>\n

For example, they said, families of students with disabilities have had well-documented problems<\/a> finding private schools that will accept ESAs, but LaHood said he needed more data before weighing in on the issue.<\/p>\n

\u201cI want to know how many children and families with disabilities actually applied for the program,\u201d LaHood said. \u201d \u2026 Some of my closest friends have children with severe disabilities, so for me, it\u2019s personal \u2014 I want to make sure they\u2019re prioritized, but I don\u2019t want to [go off of] a soundbite.\u201d<\/p>\n

According to the Houston Chronicle<\/a>, data from the Texas Comptroller\u2019s office showed that of the roughly 28,000 students in the program\u2019s highest priority tier, fewer than 30 of them had disabilities.<\/p>\n

Some who qualified are now giving their vouchers back because they didn\u2019t find a school \u2014 just as critics of the program warned before it was created.<\/p>\n

Why not everyone who got a Texas school voucher will use it<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cAs a taxpayer and a public school parent, I expect the person that represents me in HD121 to know this data,\u201d said Robbie Shepherd, the first vice president for the North East ISD Council of PTAs. \u201cI expect him to have it before he goes on the floor for a vote.\u201d<\/p>\n

After the event, NEISD Trustee Terri Chidgey also approached LaHood about comments he made suggesting the district wasn\u2019t willing to share information about its finances.<\/p>\n

LaHood said that in today\u2019s Texas House, where most of the pro-public school Republicans were voted out<\/a>, he\u2019s among a small number of Republicans who still want to beef up public school funding.<\/p>\n

\u201cI am in the minority of the majority,\u201d LaHood said Tuesday. \u201cI want to increase basic allotment.\u201d<\/p>\n

The basic allotment went up about $55 when Texas passed its massive school funding and ESA bill in 2023, but experts say<\/a> it\u2019d been so long since that figure was adjusted, it needed to rise by about $1,600 just to break even with the amount that schools were receiving in 2019.<\/p>\n

LaHood said he\u2019d be happy to fight for more \u2014 but couldn\u2019t get districts like NEISD to show him why they need it.<\/p>\n

\u201cI said, \u201cShow me your books. Let me advocate. Let me argue. Let me get more money,\u201d LaHood told the audience. \u201cI\u2019m not going to say they didn\u2019t show it to me for nefarious reasons. Maybe they didn\u2019t trust me \u2026 but we have to look at the books.\u201d<\/p>\n

The comments shocked NEISD leaders who say their finances are already publicly available \u2014 unlike the private schools who are now receiving taxpayer dollars from school vouchers.<\/p>\n

NEISD also faced one of the largest budget deficits in San Antonio this year, but it was hardly alone in that boat<\/a>. <\/p>\n

\u201cHe stated multiple times that he couldn\u2019t find what school districts were spending their money on,\u201d Chidgey said. \u201cI shared with him that the budget is a very public document. It\u2019s on the [district\u2019s] website.\u201d<\/p>\n

A growing expense<\/p>\n

In an interview after the debate, LaHood said he would judge whether ESAs were working as intended based on a handful of metrics.<\/p>\n

\u201cIs there a demand? Is it negatively affecting our public education funding? \u2026 Is it not actually getting the results?\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

\u201cI supported it because I want to make sure our children are actually getting educated. Period. That\u2019s the metric for me. Are our children learning? Are they benefiting from it? Can we afford it? \u2026 It\u2019s not rocket science.\u201d<\/p>\n

But the question of affordability is high on the minds of many headed into this next legislative session, when Comptroller Don Huffines is asking the Texas Legislature<\/a> to double the school voucher program\u2019s funding from $1 billion to $2 billion.<\/p>\n

Cooled economic growth means Texas isn\u2019t bringing in the same property tax revenue as it has in recent years, and LaHood said the state could consider expanding its revenue to fund its obligations. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s controversial, but there are new revenue sources proposed from Hollywood, from THC, from sports gambling, and other things that would generate large portions of income,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

As for the school vouchers, however, he doesn\u2019t believe there\u2019s any appetite to slow down.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it\u2019s going to be a success. I think it is already a success. I don\u2019t think it\u2019s going anywhere,\u201d he said. \u201cIf I believe something and I realize I was wrong, I\u2019ll say, \u2018Hey, you know what? I was wrong.\u2019 I don\u2019t think I was wrong.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"Zack Dunn, the Democratic candidate for Texas House District 121, speaks at a forum hosted by North East ISD Council of PTAs, in partnership with Raise Your Hand Texas, on Tuesday, Oct. 13, at the Piper Bass Memorial Student Center. Credit: Andrea Drusch \/ San Antonio Report<\/p>\n

Dunn said that\u2019s evidence LaHood wasn\u2019t willing to look critically at the issue that got him elected, after big money was spent attacking then-state Rep. Steve Allison (R-Alamo Heights) in 2024.<\/p>\n

Abbott received a record-breaking $6 million check<\/a> from an out-of-state school voucher supporter that cycle, and spent a good chunk of it campaigning against Allison<\/a>, a former Alamo Heights ISD board president who was among the last remaining public school advocates in the GOP conference.<\/p>\n

\u201cCertain people took checks \u2014 $873,000 from our governor \u2014 to vote for vouchers because the person that was in office ahead of time was an anti-voucher, pro-public education Republican,\u201d Dunn said Tuesday. \u201cThat\u2019s a fact, not a soundbite. That\u2019s what happened.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"State Rep. Marc LaHood (R-San Antonio) walked into the lion\u2019s den on Tuesday. LaHood was among the roughly…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":465575,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[8519,158586,57604,158587,82,84,83,158588,4380,17870,32626,92,158589,3028,68644],"class_list":["post-465574","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-antonio","tag-2026-election","tag-house-district-121","tag-marc-lahood","tag-rep-marc-lahood","tag-san-antonio","tag-san-antonio-headlines","tag-san-antonio-news","tag-school-voucher-bill","tag-school-vouchers","tag-texas-education-freedom-accounts","tag-texas-house-district-121","tag-top-story","tag-tx-house-district-121","tag-typedaily","tag-zack-dunn"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/465574","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=465574"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/465574\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/465575"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=465574"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=465574"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=465574"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}