I Ran Arizona’s ESA Program. Here’s What the Critics Won’t Tell You.

I ran Arizona’s Empowerment Scholarship Account Program as its executive director, and I am here to tell you that the public conversation about this program is missing something critical: the truth about how it actually works.

You have heard the claims of school choice opponents: fraud, waste, lack of accountability. What you have not heard is that robust accountability mechanisms already exist in this program, and they are working.

There have been plenty of op-eds, news reports, and counterclaims about ESA fraud. But they tend to come from people who do not have inside experience of the program’s management. I know this program from the inside and watched those guardrails operate in real time. This is what they look like.

Every parent who receives an ESA signs a legally binding contract. They must verify their children’s identities and their own Arizona residency before a single dollar is approved. Every purchase requires documentation: an invoice or a receipt. No documentation, no payment.

If an instance of misuse is suspected, the associated account is immediately suspended and reviewed. If a parent attempts to bypass that suspension by going directly to the digital wallet vendor, that act is classified as fraud and results in immediate termination. Confirmed fraud is referred to the attorney general for investigation and potential prosecution. Critically, all of that account holder’s ESA contracts may be terminated, not just the one in question. Misused funds must be repaid, and offenders can be permanently barred from the program.

The contract also prohibits account holders from concurrently accepting ESA funds and a School Tuition Organization scholarship in the same contract year. Reselling any item purchased with ESA funds is strictly prohibited. Tutors and instructional providers must have no disciplinary action pending before the State Board of Education for immoral or unprofessional conduct. These are enforceable contract terms with real consequences.

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Every morning, an automated report runs at the Arizona Department of Education cross-referencing every ESA student against public school enrollment rosters. Any student found enrolled in both loses his or her ESA account that same day. No warnings, no exceptions.

Parents agree to cover core subjects: reading, grammar, mathematics, social studies, and science. All school staff with unsupervised access to students must be fingerprinted. Cash withdrawals are prohibited, as are televisions, video game consoles, and noneducational equipment. Incomplete documentation triggers a formal audit. And any unused funds that roll over may only be used after graduation for postsecondary tuition, textbooks, and fees—nothing else.

When I personally called parents about suspicious requests, the answer was the same every time: They had made an honest mistake. They did not know the rule. After being informed, in every case they returned the funds and continued in the program.

The guardrails caught these errors, and the system worked.

The fraud rate in this program is among the lowest of any government program in Arizona. Every confirmed case of fraud has been referred for investigation or prosecution. The fact that you can find those cases in the news is not evidence the program is broken; it is proof the oversight is doing its job.

And beyond all the formal protections sits the most powerful accountability of all: these are parents who chose to be here. They have made the deliberate decision to take responsibility for their children’s education.

There is no bureaucrat, no administrator, and no government program that will ever advocate for a child the way their own parent will. That is not a weakness in the program’s accountability. That is its greatest strength.

Arizona’s ESA students are thriving. The program is accountable, it is lawful, and it is working.

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