Week in Review: DEI Dismantled

Skin color over character. Racial discrimination over equal protection. Ideological conformity over academic freedom.

They’re hallmarks of the left’s scheme to take over higher education by diverting millions of taxpayer dollars toward politicized, race- and gender-based diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programming. But the Goldwater Institute just showed the nation how to free our colleges from DEI’s tentacles. This week in Texas, Goldwater enacted a crucial reform—the most powerful of its kind in the whole country—that completely defunds the bloated apparatus of DEI administrators currently swarming the state’s public colleges and universities. And the victory sets the stage for additional wins across America.

Progressives are trying to mold K-12 education in their own image too, indoctrinating children with racist lies under the guise of DEI and Critical Race Theory. Not on Goldwater’s watch. Our new Ask Your School Now tool empowers parents to find out what’s going on in their kids’ schools, and our nation-leading Academic Transparency reform ensures school districts inform parents of what’s being taught, including racially divisive curriculum content.

Thanks to Goldwater’s work, radical DEI is now poised for a rapid downfall.

Read more at In Defense of Liberty.

New Hope for Patients

A new wave of patient-centric healthcare reform is picking up steam: This week, the Goldwater Institute enacted the Right to Try for Individualized Treatments in Nevada, expanding our original Right to Try law to cutting-edge treatments that are tailor-made for each individual.

Goldwater passed the first Right to Try law in 41 states and at the federal level to protect terminally ill patients’ right to access investigational treatments advancing through the Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) approval process. Right to Try is saving countless lives, but today, the latest innovations in medicine are made specifically for each patient, and by definition cannot go through the FDA’s outdated regulatory processes in a timely manner. That’s why the Right to Try for Individualized Treatments, which passed the Nevada Legislature with overwhelming bipartisan backing thanks to a groundswell of support from patient advocates, is the natural next step.

This urgently needed reform is now law in two states, Nevada and Arizona. And just like we did with the original Right to Try, Goldwater intends to take this reform nationwide, enacting it in state after state, from coast to coast, and making it the law of the land. Tens of millions of Americans with rare diseases are seeking new hope. Each of them, and every American, deserves the Right to Try. And Goldwater will never stop until every American can exercise this fundamental right.

Read more at In Defense of Liberty. 

Gov. Hobbs Tries to Cancel School Choice. Goldwater Fights Back

Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs is trying to illegally snatch school choice away from kindergarten families who were counting on it. This week, the Goldwater Institute sent a letter to Gov. Hobbs, making clear that the governor’s office has no right to break its legally binding promises.

The governor’s office previously pledged to provide the State Treasurer with federal grant money to fund access to all-day kindergarten for those participating in Arizona’s Empowerment Scholarship Account (ESA) program. But last month, Gov. Hobbs abruptly announced that the grant was canceled.

It’s just the governor’s latest attack on ESAs. But Goldwater is holding her accountable—and Gov. Hobbs’ illegal actions won’t stop the education freedom movement’s momentum. Already, Goldwater’s immensely successful and popular expansion of Arizona’s ESA program, which the Institute created more than a decade ago, has empowered thousands of families to customize their child’s education around that student’s unique needs. And Goldwater has used this new gold standard for school choice as a model to enact universal ESAs in four more states just in 2023 alone.

It’s simple: Gov. Hobbs can’t lawlessly renege on promises made to families simply because she doesn’t like school choice.

Read more at In Defense of Liberty.