Andy and Jed explore the intersection of education and politics in a rapidly changing landscape. They start by analyzing the Democratic Party's surprising silence on education during their convention, delving into why education has become a party splitter and how this could affect upcoming elections. The conversation then shifts to Kamala Harris' role and what her presidency might mean for education policy, especially concerning the influence of teacher unions and school choice. The hosts also tackle the Republican stance on universal vouchers, the evolving dynamics within the GOP, and the broader implications for urban education in cities like Chicago and St. Louis. This episode is packed with in-depth analysis, covering everything from the NEA's strategic influence to the potential long-term consequences of declining public school enrollment. Don't miss this insightful conversation that sheds light on the critical issues facing American education today.

SHOW NOTES:

• Andy's Eduwonk post on Biden being a centrist
• Andy's Eduwonk post on Tim Walz
• Tim Daly's piece about grading the Biden Administration on education policy
• The cringy "Mommala moment" from the Drew Barrymore interview with Kamala Harris
• The full interview between Barrymore and Harris
• Derrell Bradford and Tim DeRoche's Op-Ed in the 74 about Milliken vs Bradley

Hey, Andy.

Hey, Jed.

How are you?

Yeah, it's been a little while.

This summer's been so crazy busy.

I hope, all's treating you well.

Yeah, we've had a really great summer, of all kinds of ventures

before the kids left for college.

So I've been, been all over the place and doing a bunch of different stuff.

So I'm sorry, I haven't had a chance to see you and check in.

Hey, no problem.

I did the drop off at college as well, with, for our second.

no, that routine, but there's just been so much stuff going on this summer that,

I've been wanting to talk with you and see what you're thinking about things.

So heck I just want to dive straight in and see what what

you're thinking about stuff.

You ready to go?

Yeah, man.

a lot has been happening in the educational world and the

larger, larger political world.

I think the last time we talked, the party line was that like Joe Biden was

running circles around his 25 year old.

staffers and then, that's right.

during the Republican convention, I really had some questions for you.

In fact, we were swapping texts on those things and we haven't really

had a chance to talk about it.

But in the interim, we had no answers because, yeah, then we get

to the democratic inexplicable.

but let's you mind if we start with the Democrats and then maybe

go back and just re, re touch.

Democrats is fresher.

it's more recent.

yeah, and in some ways less predictable because it was obviously

not the convention people thought it would be, a little bit ago.

Yeah, I think I'd love to, hear your thoughts.

I saw your piece that you wrote about walls and, and I,

I wrote about walls as well.

there are a variety of things that I've been talking about.

I thought it was noteworthy.

I think the Wall Street Journal did a, article yesterday or two days ago

where they were speculating on who might be appointed To all of the different

posts if Harris were to win and they must have done every single cabinet

position Except education secretary and it I just think it's reflective

of what's going on in the democratic world Generally, they just are trying

to erase education Conflict or policy work of any kind from the landscape.

Just keep it down.

low on the profile low on the on the roster of priorities here.

Do you see things any differently now?

Look, it's a party splitter, right?

And, so they, the one, one of the areas, a couple of areas of dem vulnerability

going into the fall, all type education, ends up being a piece, not the whole

thing, but a piece of the issue there.

So that's, they're concerned about their performance among black voters.

Obviously there's a lot more excitement now than there was.

Yeah.

Not too, long ago, but that's still a problem.

Particularly, young black men, they are, struggling among moderates

and, centrist to some extent, and.

Education, it's a party splitter, among those populations.

And so I think they're figuring the, cause it, cause the, obviously cause

of the union, the union positions, on a number of reform issues, whether it's,

choice, accountability, all of it.

So I think, yeah, it's if, you don't talk about it, you'll probably do

less damage between now and November.

This is not the time for a big inner party fight.

that seems like the strategy.

Yeah.

And there are all sorts of things that are happening

perhaps above the charter school.

Pay grade, as they're making their calculations about what to do.

I think for the Shapiro possible selection as vice president, the his stand on school

choice was obviously a very big problem and, the NEA and others were actively

working to make sure that he would not be chosen for, education reasons.

But then there were the other, there was the stuff around Gaza and Israel.

and then apparently there was something around.

just a chemistry between him and Harris that factored in.

But I got to say in the end, I really wasn't surprised.

That's the basic thing is the chemistry.

Look, he's an ambitious guy and like her first hire wouldn't need

to be an education secretary.

Wouldn't need to be a food taster.

and so yeah, so that I, it, seemed.

and they probably could have worked around that.

There's plenty of presidents and vice presidents who didn't have

necessarily great chemistry, but we're able to work together.

The issue was on top of all that other, on top of all that other stuff,

Why run the risk of drama?

I just think they wanted something drama free and walls, I think, was a

solid candidate that helped in the kind of helps in the rust belt projects who

they want into, rural voters and I, at least as it relates to education issues.

I think he's just remarkably unremarkable.

He's, he is.

Yeah.

and to go back to Shapiro for a sec, Shapiro is quite remarkable in that he's

been running for buck orthodoxy at times.

And I think that's for the, I think it's less the choice thing.

we had in 2004, we had a democratic vice presidential

nominee who was very pro voucher.

and, that can be, That can be finessed.

I think the thing with Shapiro is they didn't, they feel like he's not,

they can't necessarily control him.

and if you're somebody like me, you think that's good because he's going to

actually do creative innovative policy.

But if you're the teacher's unions, that's just a huge liability.

And so they wanted somebody a lot more predictable.

And I think one of the things that came through with walls, including

all the reactions to him from Minnesotans that we gathered is

he's, he seems pretty predictable.

Yeah, and I think, hearing from Joe Nathan, hearing from Amber and the

others that you interviewed, it seems as though, obviously, an educator himself,

cares a lot about public education, has a lot of alignment with the teacher

unions, but for our charter folk in Minnesota, They haven't found him to

be one that's actively going against them or really causing problems is,

perhaps, a low key supporter, as long as things don't get very controversial.

Did you pick up anything different in your discussions?

No, we could talk about that.

I do think so, over the years I've done some work in Minnesota, I spent

a little time around the Capitol with some of the political leaders there.

One thing that, really has always struck me is there's generally

a pragmatism and let's figure out, what's good for Minnesota?

What should we do here?

It's not that there's not disagreement in ideology.

but like on the charter school thing, Walls, he's definitely

no fan of charter schools.

And anyone who's trying to tell you that is spinning you.

But on the other hand, he's there, they're there, they're educating kids.

So he brings I think just like a degree of seriousness.

Like what do we do about this?

that you don't see in some of these other sort of ideological, just a,

degree of like practicality because it's people's kids are in these schools.

They're trying to live their lives.

How do you not be like hyper disruptive?

and that's what we heard, but you didn't hear anybody who's Oh,

he's just like a great friend.

He's a great reformer.

And so I think one of the takeaways for this is

I, wrote a piece of this a while ago and throw in the show notes that,

Joe, saying Joe Biden's a centrist.

And of course, I got an ear full of shit from the usual

suspects are like, no, he's woke.

It's all lefty and everything.

It's no, he's find, where the median sort of set of politics with the

democratic party is any point in time.

And you're going to find Joe Biden, like when he got into Politics.

He was like opposed to busing.

And then, the last few years he's been, in a totally different place

on a number of race issues and guts because the Democratic Party's evolved.

I think Harris is the same way.

And I think walls is the same way.

And what they have in common is that surprise their politicians.

and that's what they're going to do.

And so the reform community has to figure out, okay, because you were saying going

to the fall, no one's really talking about education yet because there's no pressure.

And so the reform has to figure out how do you create pressure to force those

hard Conversations and force those issues.

that's, I think otherwise you're going to get, and the sort of parallel I'd use is

last night in her speech, when she talked about the war in Gaza, like essentially

Harris had something for everybody.

She said, Israel should be able to defend itself.

Hamas is terrible.

The people in Gaza should be able to live a life of dignity and security

and not put up with many of the things that they've been putting up with.

Which essentially is by the way, this position, most people agree with, except

the hardcore ideologues on all sides.

But it was a something for everybody policy cause they wanted to go away

until the second week in November.

and I think we're seeing the same thing.

We're seeing the same thing on education.

How significant do you think it is that Harris becomes the candidate without

having run the gauntlet of the primary process, which is usually the place

where NEA and AFT invite the candidates to come and speak and really kowtow

specifically to their extreme agenda.

The fact that there wasn't that, Harris, she had to do it in 2019,

but it's now, four years later.

That's distant history.

It seems to me as though the lack of the primary process and that key leverage

point for the unions allows Harris and Walls to perhaps stake out something a

little bit more moderate and neutral.

But am I reading it differently than you?

It allows them to whether they will is going to be a different story.

and they're already, getting wrapped in that whole process.

I think, the thing with Harris, she has been tested in a primary in 2020.

It didn't go well.

like her challenge itself.

is she's a very good inside player.

She's been very successful in California, democratic politics,

obviously, as sort of her rise shows.

And more about this.

I want to hear your take on this.

She hasn't really, you people say, she hasn't earned a vote outside of

California and that's like half true.

she was on the ticket in 2020.

So people across the country, voted for it and that ticket got more votes, but,

But there is something to the idea.

She's basically been more of an inside player.

She's California politics are not Republican Democrats or

intra democratic politics.

and so what is that going to look like?

And I think if I'm the unions, I like that because she's proven pretty well at

operating in a space that they control pretty effect, pretty effectively.

she hasn't had to govern and persuade across the middle.

And you saw that a little bit of, I think the democratic

convention went extremely well.

We can talk about that.

But the one thing I thought was interesting is there was not as much

pitching to persuadables and moderates and like, how do we really like peel

off some Nikki Haley voters and all of this than you would have thought.

there was a lot of stuff that was aimed pretty squarely at the base.

And I think the base is pretty squarely in her corner.

That's not where, that's not where she risks losing votes and what looks

like it's gonna be a tight election.

Yeah.

I thought it was striking that In the Democratic Party platform,

education literally doesn't make the table of contents.

The Republican convention, document, it was near the top and they were expansive

in all the things that they want to get done, whether or not we agree with those

things or whatever, they have a theory.

They feel like they're on offense.

And in order to get to the education stuff, you had to click

into one of their subcommit.

It was like something about reducing costs.

It was reducing costs.

Education is in there and you reduce like the higher ed costs,

And then that provides the segue to talk about the rest of education.

Don't you find it striking that, the democratic party would be so,

quiet, so under the radar about, things that wants to do in education.

Yeah.

especially because if I'm remembering right, the 2021.

They obviously didn't go hardcore to choice, but it did talk about

ending, making sure there's quality options across every zip code.

I think a reasonable person then says, then maybe we should not

have zip code based education, but, but it's even a walk back.

It's even a walk back from that.

Yeah, it was.

look, they want the issue.

They want the issue to go away.

we can get to the Republicans.

Their platform is no great shakes either, even by the standards of these things.

It was pretty vacuous and like thematic with your you'll search in

vain for any real policy on education.

but yeah, it's a good example.

They want this.

They want this problem to go away, at least through.

at least through November.

And what do you think?

And for reformers, I will say we're going to be back in the same spot where

everybody like, everybody was like Cardona people who, hasn't necessarily had a great

run as secretary, but people are relieved.

They weren't relieved.

Cause oh my God, we got this great.

Person is going to be transformative.

It was like, like the thing you heard ever, I could have

been worse, which is true.

and we're going to end performance.

We'll be right back in that same spot.

if Harris wins in November.

Yeah.

It'll be interesting to see whether or not they just, whether Harris just

appoints Cardona again, we want no, no attention on education issues.

We want no drama, just.

going would not surprise me at all.

But I, I think it's interesting.

That's a good, that's a good thing, Jed.

I don't know if you saw Tim Daly's piece.

At what point are people going to be willing to say we've now had basically

eight years of a leadership vacuum over there, and we can't afford 12.

That's a, kid's entire travel through, through the public education system.

And I was struck.

So Tim writes this piece and all these people are willing to talk

anonymously about how exasperated they are, how bad it's been, but

hardly anybody will go on the record.

And it's like, that, that's, not a good look for this community.

Like at some point, like, when are people going to say, Hey, you know what?

Like you can hold two things to your head at the same time.

I'm not trying to be coy.

Like I'm somehow like an independent analyst on this.

I want Kamala Harris to win in November.

I don't think Donald Trump should be president, but I can hold that

in my head and also say, this has not been a great run on education.

I'm going to be voting for, despite.

What it looks like.

Same thing as Biden and I voted for Biden 2020 the same way.

And this community is struggling with that.

And I think it's a problem and it leads to like bad policy, no pressure for change.

and, we're getting, what we get.

I think we see a democratic party though, that.

Is moderating generally and maybe something just for electoral strategy

and we end up sagging back to something different But it's noteworthy to me that

you see in california Newsome say bring me, you know some anti crime legislation

anti, theft mom stuff And we see them harris basically embrace an immigration

bill that you know, not so long ago would have been considered completely

anathema You In the democratic race.

So it seems to be like all over the place with four years ago, if you were saying

this country is the greatest country on earth, like literally, let's let's let's

let's not put too fond of a point on this.

Like they're like, there were workshops across the education sector saying

if you said that you were hopelessly unreconstructed, if not just outright

racist, for saying that this is the greatest country on the face of the

earth, the greatest Republican history.

and people were chanting that.

Yeah.

Last night.

So it's not just moderating.

It's just a complete makeover.

which look, I'm, good with.

I've been saying like the Democrats need to be more normal

and they'll win more elections.

but like it is, noteworthy just how much

again, like it says something about the community that you

and I operate in, like where,

how quickly everybody can, just different tune starts playing, everybody changes

the dance and that, that should cause at least some questioning about, the

degree and deepness of people's political commitments around some of this stuff.

the contrast, though, is that in all of these other places where you see

them re anchoring, repositioning.

There's nothing happening in education.

There's just absolute silence.

And I wonder, yeah.

Science 1 0 1, though, you know this, like the, folks who think America's

nothing but a litany of sins.

They're out there and they're loud, but they're not really organized.

The teacher's unions are quite organized and in politics, organized always

beats diffused, and the few times it doesn't organize comes roaring

back and wins on the second track.

. Yeah.

is it, is this a different way of saying the other.

Issues are ones where there's not a constituency strong enough to resist

them re anchoring, but education is, that what you're basically,

is that a re learning element?

one of the things, you can have your pick of special interest groups, like

if you're telling me like, if you have to be ruled by somebody like the N.

E.

A.

Or the N.

R.

A.

Like it's a reasonable thing to say, I'll take the N.

E.

A.

But like they're both fundamentally interest groups.

And what happens is people ascribe these virtues and to these interest groups

that and they're all that this interest groups do the same kind of stuff.

They influence the process the same way.

and so there's a reason like the republicans act the way they act on guns.

Because the NRA is organized, they are there, and frankly a bunch of like even

harder core, pro gun groups, on the NEA's, excuse me, on the NRA's right flank.

and it's the same thing with, with the teachers unions, and it's worth noting

inside the teachers unions, the pressure on the leadership there is not to

moderate, it's to be more extreme, right?

That's what they're getting, internally, and that's how it's

impacting their leadership.

And so So it's just, it's, the same reason we don't suddenly expect the

oil companies to like completely change their tune on environmental issues.

We don't expect wall street to change its tune on financial regulation.

Like it's just when it happens in our sector, everybody treats it as somehow

like very different and unusual, and maybe those things don't apply.

It's the same thing.

It's special interest politics.

And Reformers could do worse than say, okay, we're trying to change a

publicly governed system with heavy, heavy special interest involvement.

How has that worked or not worked in other sectors?

What do you do instead of thinking that somehow this

issue we work on is a unicorn?

so question, I, accept all that.

I think it's the right analysis.

Now, here's the next question.

Okay, they can't pivot.

They can't move on education issues.

But then look what is happening in urban education right now.

it's just so striking.

Brandon Johnson, the mayor of Chicago, spent his whole life working in education

and for the union, when he welcomes people to Chicago, he can't even mention what's

going on within Chicago public schools.

He's trying to force out, Martinez right now.

The implosion in CPS is just, Tragic.

There was the same thing happening in Milwaukee, a few months earlier

at the Republican convention.

I don't know if you're following what's going on in St.

Louis.

This is an abject tragedy.

I just, I don't think long term the Dem policymakers can stay on not changing.

When this is what's happening within major urban school districts across the country.

Am I right or wrong here?

I don't know.

I feel like the one thing that people like under value is the dem the dem

leadership They have an enormous ally and supporter, in their ability to kick

this down the road and that's called the republicans and so you always think

there's going to be a reckoning on this because it is it's untenable as you're

saying from any sort of moral standpoint value standpoint Like at all connecting

like rhetoric with action, and especially, post pandemic, it's just unacceptable.

Except then the Republicans go off and do their stuff.

And and you have to go back to, George Bush had a sort of compelling,

effective and coherent education policy, and the Republicans are doing

really well on education, and they were doing well in a positive way.

Now they're doing okay on it, but it's mostly Because of parental frustration.

you have some Republican governors who are reasonably popular on it, but in

general, so nationally, it's more like people are still frustrated and so forth.

And so they're doing well because people are just fed up and not doing well.

Cause like people are really excited about some sort of positive affirmative agenda

and there's obviously, cause they're less.

hindered on some of this stuff by the, politics, there is an agenda out

there for them, that they could take in terms of like transparency, choice,

accountability, empowering parents.

Like it's a bunch of really popular stuff, but it's hard for them.

it's hard for them to walk back from crazy.

And it's particularly hard when Donald Trump's at the top of your ticket.

Yeah, I don't know if you see it.

I don't know if you see it differently, but that's where

it's like it's a two party.

It's a two party dynamic.

And so you're

until one party, the Democrats really got their act together for a while in

education when, when there was pressure and when the pressure is not there.

and there's a vacuum, you get what we see now.

Yeah, I blame it on the Republicans.

I guess to some extent, I primarily blame it on us.

Yeah.

I don't think we have a theory.

I don't think we have an idea about what's supposed to happen

in places like Chicago and St.

Louis.

the, new lead of the Missouri Association, Noah Devine, I think

this guy is doing an incredible job, but he's early in his tenure.

And, he, emails me and we call, we talk about, what's the playbook

or what it's supposed to, what's the charter school world supposed

to do when something like St.

Louis happens?

I'm sure we have 10, 15 examples of like things that would help

me in my moment right now.

And.

He was just shocked to learn.

We don't really have any examples.

We don't have any North Star in these places, and my sense is that

if we had an agenda, if we had a North Star, if we were pushing for it

proactively, and then these implosions happen, they may have ignored us.

Before, but in the moment of the implosion, they're not going to ignore

it anymore, but we don't have it.

No.

And the question is, who's the us there?

Like I, I was struck.

Donald Trump was terrible.

and he didn't do much on charters and the extent he proposed policies.

They weren't particularly good ideas in my view.

But, He at least talked about choice and so forth and said

he was going to do some stuff.

And that caused a number of people to simply abandon choice and walk away.

Cause if Trump and DeVos were for it, then they didn't want to be for it.

And my view is if your political commitments on this stuff are that easily

rattled, Reverse then they're not real.

That's not a real political commitment to begin with.

Yeah.

and so I think the question I agree with you.

I'm just pushing on this.

I think we have to define who is this idea of us?

'cause I think what charters have discovered or should have discovered is

they have a lot of really fickle friends.

Who are not going to be there at all when there's any kind of headwind.

I guess us, in this context, is wonky folk.

Both the charter school people and the ed reformers.

What is our theory here?

And I don't think we have one.

and we really pay the price in moments like this.

I will just, I know we've been talking about this, Dem convention piece.

and may, whatever.

I think sometimes I am the more pessimistic one.

or I'm, talking about half empty rather than half full, and I got

to, moderate my own language.

My mom, gives me a hard time from time, from, time to time.

I'm a little bit more sanguine in, in, in what may happen with

the Democratic Party right now.

I just feel like having not refreshed, They're anchoring to any a stuff.

I think Bowman losing is actually pretty important.

He was, one of the most anti charter legislators that's out there.

I just think, the time is ripe.

They haven't really committed anything.

And in that moment of vacuum.

To assert ourselves in ways that shows how our policy agenda and our north

star actually Fits perfectly within the pantheon of democratic values.

Now is our moment.

We should be getting ourselves ready I agree.

I agree with that but that takes political pressure takes sustained political

pressure and it takes a willingness to have real hard conversations with your

allies and I worry I agree Like people think that will just happen organically.

there's just a lot of vibes rather than that's a process.

This is about power and you have to, it has to be rested away.

and that's that's a long process.

And I do feel like people are still very much in a sort of do no harm mode

where it's okay, we'll have, a lot of big donors, support charters, maybe

they can head off like the worst stuff.

And, the, That making sure that like a call for more transparency doesn't

become a bunch of, regulations intended to curtail the growth of charters.

that's not a great place, to be.

yeah, I'm always optimistic that, there's going to be, politics ebbs

and flows and, ideas coming in waves.

And there's,

a trough they call punctuate equilibrium is always, I'm always optimistic

over time, but I think people undervalue how much this stuff just

does not just happen out of thin air.

So is there anything you want to go back to as it relates

to the Republican convention?

We, we've spoken a lot about Dems here.

Yeah.

And, were there any observations you wanted to share there?

Yeah.

look, I don't know, like it struck me, I think, and again, I think the Dems had

a, I think the Dems had better convention in some ways than the Republicans did.

The Republicans didn't like super damage themselves, but I don't

think they accomplished much.

Whereas the Dems, I don't think that this a really close election.

I think the polls, as of when we're recording, even, accounting for

the volatility, that's it's tight.

the Dems, put themselves in a position to create a permission structure

to lower back a lot of, persuadable voters, but they haven't done it yet.

Now they gotta do that this fall.

The Republican convention, I feel like it was just an enormous

missed opportunity for them.

It seemed coming out of the assassination attempt and everything, Trump had

to basically do two big things, pick a compelling vice president.

And, give a normal acceptance speech on the last night of

the convention and lay out the framework for the case for the fall.

And he failed at both of those just miserably.

So I was actually one of those people.

I was like, he could probably close the deal this week.

And then attention just turns to, okay, like how bad is the

damage going to be down ballot?

in the Senate, in the House, everything else, but instead

he picked the vice president.

You can argue like, vice presidents don't matter that much.

And the advance on the van stuff may be overstated, but the fact is every

day you're explaining, something crazy that your, vice president said.

You're not communicating your message.

You're not.

And so the Republicans have a, they have a JD Vance problem there because

clearly nobody vetted this stuff.

Not that it would necessarily be disqualifying, but just like nobody,

like I said, you got to have an answer.

When somebody asks you about this stuff about childless, people and

stuff, you got to have an answer.

And they were just totally caught.

so just complete political malpractice.

And then, the acceptance speech was just bonkers.

If trump, could just be a little bit normal and say something like, Hey,

you know what, like our politics and our rhetoric have gotten out of hand.

we saw evidence of that this week and I deserve, some responsibility

for that as well as, there's responsibility to go around.

We need to off.

He had just been like remotely normal, but he cannot do that.

he's so defective.

That he could, he couldn't even, let alone if he believes any of that,

he couldn't, utter the words that they're putting in front of him.

it's, which to me is precisely why he should not be,

and so I feel like for them,

the racist still status quo, it's close and a chance they had

to maybe, to maybe make a move.

they, blew.

it wasn't terrible.

Like they didn't again, no, like terrible damage, but I don't think, I don't think

they helped themselves in a way that they had an opportunity to, and then

the race reset and I still don't think.

And you're seeing this, they don't have a good response to Kamala Harris yet.

And, they better figure it out because the election's coming.

And she, I think this idea that she was just going to be a terrible candidate.

this, a lot of stuff can still happen, but so far she's doing, she's,

politically she's doing quite Well, in terms of the Republican convention,

in terms of just milestones that have now shifted, it seems pretty clear now

the litmus test is universal vouchers.

Universal is in there now, and it was the second highest priority.

The other one was some cockamamie throwaway.

Universal vouchers is the new it is the new litmus test and we saw in Tennessee,

the governor took out several that would not support universal vouchers.

And now he's gearing up to take another run at the Tennessee vouchers.

and of course Abbott did the same thing in Texas.

I think we're going to see even more universal voucher pressure happen.

I do think that, should they prevail and should there be

a democratic administration, which is not willing to allow.

federal funds to flow to voucher funded schools.

The disconnect between red and blue policymakers is going to get even

more pronounced, especially when red state politicians find that

their universal programs are very difficult to afford at the state level.

I just see us careening further forward in that dysfunctional direction.

Yeah, this will be an issue to watch.

The two things I'm paying attention to there a little bit.

One, inside the Republican Party, there's an interesting dynamic where you're right,

that is becoming the price of admission.

But because of their constitutional structures and so forth, this is

not an option really in every state.

And so what is it gonna, what's the effect going to be Governors who

can't actually do a lot of this stuff.

They're not going to have a record on it because their state doesn't allow it.

And you saw a little bit of that with, in the Republican primary,

when Nikki Haley and Ron DeSantis got into it about who was better.

And, DeSantis was like hitting her on, the stuff she didn't do.

And she's Hey, look at my state, look at, here's the apparatus I

have to operate in, usually, which it was a political conversation.

So DeSantis wasn't having any of that, but like she was making a good point.

Hey, can I, I can only do so much.

We have a constitution.

and that's going to affect other governors.

And so how that plays out enter.

And my concern is, does that then lead to people want to

distinguish themselves other ways?

So you end up on some of these really divisive social issues instead.

so that's a dynamic I'd pay attention to.

And then a second one is, look, the Dem lineup in the Senate is tough.

You never, everyone's full of certitude in politics, as a couple,

again, the last time we were together, Everybody said there's

no way Biden was going to drop out.

there's all these, all these things.

and so people should know better.

so but the Senate's a tough lineup for the Democrats.

If you look at this, they really need to, draw to an inside straight.

So Bill Cassidy from Louisiana may well become, the chair of the,

Senate, the Committee that Handles Education, the HELP Committee.

He has a choice bill in now that hasn't gotten a lot of attention,

that I would pay attention to.

And I think he, you would see more choice activity.

He's not an ideologue.

and he's really good on a bunch of education.

He's terrific on child mental health, for instance.

yeah.

he's a doctor.

so I would keep an eye out for something on choice for him.

And to your situation you're talking about, you could see this

emerging as actually a negotiation point where we're, how, much

flexibility do you give these states?

What does it, what does it look like?

And so forth.

So I think that's going to be, that's going to be an issue worth watching.

how that, I think you're onto something and how that dynamic plays out.

Yeah, I think that's gonna be foundational.

And I don't think there's been that much policy substance related to Vance.

I would glob onto except I found it interesting.

I saw an interview where he was talking about the child tax credit

and how, and he's a big supporter of it, which is noteworthy and

new for at least some Republicans.

But he was very clear in the interview.

It's not right that this tax value would only come to low income families

and absolutely everybody should get it.

And it just seems like a positioning that's very consistent with the,

these universal vouchers, which is, Hey, let's go up with a dollar amount

and give the same to everybody.

And that's going to get us the.

Result we want in the end.

Yeah, look, I'm not a big JD Vance fan.

and some of the, stuff he said is being caricatured and so forth,

and he does have a view on like the tax code helping families, and you

can argue whether it's a good idea.

He is had some ideas on like basically picking winners and losers at, on, on tax.

Policy based on family structure, which I think you can argue the

tax code shouldn't be doing that.

But like he's pretty consistent on it.

And you're seeing that you're seeing that here.

And I think what's interesting is the Republican Party is in evolution.

it's, there's a MAGA party.

there's the, establishment Republicans.

there's a shaking out going on.

It's very fast.

fluid.

And so you saw so as discordant as it was like, again, to see like the

Democrats, all chanting, you, it sounded like the Democratic convention sounded

like a Republican convention at points.

The Republican convention, you had this weird thing, you had these

delegates on the floor holding these like anti immigrant signs and so forth.

And yet both the, People on the ticket, the both the presidential

candidate and the vice presidential candidate are married to immigrants.

and Vance's personal life is very, illustrative of the United

States and how we're changing and how the country's evolving and

becoming more inclusive and better.

And so I feel like, there's more to, there's, there, there's, there,

I don't know what side's gonna win.

I can't handicap.

that.

but it does seem like there's an evolution going on and things are gonna,

things are gonna look different one way or another when the dust settles.

someday we need to get to a political circumstance such that

we can actually talk about issues.

And at least from my standpoint, if we look at this over a multi decade,

landscape, We're in declining population.

We're in declining enrollment, and the countries that succeed are

the ones that are going to be able to attract the young people that

their economies need to succeed.

And yes, some of those young people will be coming from a

variety of different contexts.

Some of them will be more affluent countries and all that kind of

stuff, but a significant portion of them are not going to be.

And the question is going to be, not only can countries.

Be smart enough to recognize that they should be letting these young

families in, but they can also do a great job of educating their kids.

Once they arrive, this is an imperative for the country right now.

That's nowhere discussed.

Position, George Bush was like, we have to like, have a well regulated

orderly border, but once people are here under whatever circumstance,

their kids ought to be in school and now that's being revisited, right?

People want to, change that.

To me, that's just common.

You should have kids in school.

And frankly, look, I'm, very pro immigrant.

given my family background, how could I not be?

But, if like immigrants historically, maybe this will be the time they'll

be different, but historically they always make us better.

They make us stronger.

They make us more dynamic.

And we, we, we periodically forget that.

I remember Trump in 2016, one of his attack lines on Hillary was

if, Hillary Clinton wins, there'll be a taco truck on every corner.

And it was interesting because a lot of people are like, is

that, wait, are you for her?

Cause that sounds great.

And like you just, it, the communities flourish.

That's what makes America such an interesting tapestry.

And I think the party that can get to that sooner, we'll also

saying, look, any country has to have an orderly regulated border.

You're not a country.

And I think like the can get there.

And I think Harris took some strides, at least rhetorically trying to get there.

that, that couldn't have gone, she was talking about being tougher on the border.

This is, a few months ago, Biden was apologizing for using

the word illegal immigrant.

That tells you how much things, how much, how fast things are changing.

Yeah, the foundational difference between now and then, from my standpoint, is

that back then we thought that we were on a trajectory for global population

exceeding 20 billion, and we're just going to have too many people altogether.

And now we're in this recognition where, wait a second, the dem

demographic pyramids are such that.

We have aging societies and not enough young people.

And so it just completely changes the imperative for a country.

And yet our discussion is still locked into jingoism and cultural issues.

And it's just at some point.

Here's the weird thing.

That's the rhetoric.

But then you look at more and more how people are living their lives.

You look at the rate of, interracial and cross ethnic marriages and all of this,

like people, if you believe in revealed preferences, Which I do people are moving.

There's all this rhetoric in this, but things are moving, in a different

direction and not always in ways.

People predict, right?

everybody thought that the increasing number of Hispanic Americans was

going to, it would be inevitable that there'd just be a wave for Democrats.

And as it turns out, Reagan was more right that like their, Republicans,

they just didn't know it yet.

It was what he used to say.

And that's what's, that's what's happening.

And it's, it's scrambling our politics.

And yeah, I don't know.

I just think, I'm more optimist.

I think you get these loud voices and so forth.

But I think most people appreciate this is good.

And frankly, in our little corner of the world at the public schools,

they ought to be on the front lines of being pro immigration because

we're losing kids because people are moving out of a lot of these places.

They are sending their kids to other options and that

accelerated after the pandemic.

And to your point, there's fewer we've got this demographic thing.

So they should be they should be out in front This is their this

is like their your customer base.

and they should be out in front on that Yeah, let's strike you together.

I mean if harris wins, we will have the not just the first, first man in the in

the in as a part of this, but we will have a first couple that is interracial.

and if you look at the, the Olympic sport, the U.

S.

team, it was like every single winner, was running into the crowd to embrace

people of different races that were either their spouses or their moms or whatever.

That's my point.

This is how, people like pollsters don't even ask some of these questions

that they used to ask about things like interracial issues because it's a waste

of a poll question because it always comes back overwhelmingly because it's

just not, people are more likely to be concerned that their, son or daughter,

much more likely now to be concerned their son or daughter is in an interpolitical

relationship, that they're on a Republican dating a Democrat or Democrat dating a

Republican than they are worried about the sort of stuff that used to hang people up.

Yeah.

so yeah, I would say one thing on Harris is why we're on it.

because it ties into our family issues, what we do.

So you remember a couple of months ago she was, before she was nominee, she

went on the Drew Barrymore show and okay, Drew Barrymore did this really weird,

cringy, kind of kids would say cringy, thing where she was like, you're our

mama and we need a national mama law.

Yeah, it was very weird.

and Drew Barrymore, her whole posture was strange.

As someone said, it was as if Kamala Harris had Coke and Drew Barrymore

knew, it was just very, it was a very weird interaction was weird.

And, but what was really disappointing about it to me was, and it was the

example of other terrible advance work that has plagued Harris.

what, what was interesting about it to me though, is just before that

they had a fascinating exchange.

Where Harris was talking about having a blended family and what that's and

how, being, being a, a step mom and that sort of and it was one of these answers.

You were like, it took me back.

I was like the last time you had a vice president talking about this, that was

probably quail and the Murphy Brown stuff.

And he was coming at it from a different direction.

It was like, one of these things, it was like how we live now.

And these are issues that culture warriors are going to get so Spun up about, but

like average Americans like, Oh yeah, you have to navigate those issues.

And this is, it was a very empathetic human kind of answer and it just got

drowned out by the mommal awareness of Drew Barrymore in the next, moment.

That's the part that went viral.

And I thought it was too bad to your point that this is like a

fairly, typical kind of situation.

you've got a blended family, you've had a divorce.

It's and I just wish we could talk about that.

And Trump.

Could talk about that too.

His wife is an immigrant.

He has a buddy.

If he had, more of an empathy gene or was willing to show it in public or whatever,

he could talk about these things too.

And I think it'd be good.

Not that we need to be parented from the White House, but just to talk about

how things are changing and like to talk about that in more normal, and more

normal terms, I think would be, yeah.

Would be healthy for us in terms of our little issue, education would help

then tie into, okay, what are the kinds of conversations we need to be having

about what do families need actually?

and what should we be doing, in the education sector, the public sector,

the, independent charter sector, the private sector to accommodate

that, that would be a very healthy.

Conversation, but instead we get culture wars and mama.

Yeah.

can't wrap up without Taking advantage of this opportunity given, we're

talking about society evolving and then our politics and our policies

are like vestiges of the past that hold us, in a dysfunctional fixity.

I can't help but mention, Milliken versus Bradley.

And I know I obsess on this and you're going to give me a hard

time about it, but I just, thank goodness for Tim and Darrell.

They actually wrote something.

the 74 did put something out.

there was a Detroit newspaper that did two articles about it.

And then nothing else.

We just say for people who don't always listen, aren't Darrell Bradford,

who's president of 50 cam, which is education advocacy organization.

He's very pro choice and getting rid of barriers to people

being able to go to school.

And Tim Deroche, who runs an organization called available to

all, which is about school boundaries and school district boundaries.

And then Milliken versus Bradley is the decision that was made 50 years ago.

the last week of July that basically said that integration efforts cannot

happen, cannot be required to involve, suburban and just contributed to

white flight and a lot of stuff.

And just cracked public education across these lines of division that are still

there to this very day I find it just disheartening that supreme court case

Didn't get greater attention every time brown versus board of education

happens Everybody talks about it and no one talks about The next case that

came along, 20 years later, or I guess it was whatever that is, what is that?

Yeah.

20 years, 20 years later.

And, we don't do math on this.

Exactly.

It's 20 years later and it basically unwound or, defanged, brown versus white.

And I thought that, Darrell and Tim did a great job because they, were able to say,

look, the idea that would have happened had the Supreme Court case not been

decided that way is that forced busing.

Across all these lines would have been required and anybody

that's supporting Forrest Buzzi.

But the idea that we have these lines that prevent people from being able to get to

the schools that they want to go to, I just find it surprising that our world

is not more deeply anchored on the need to get rid of these scourges in society.

the politics are strange, right?

Because this is one of these ones where now, because of the political

arrangements, it's the people on the left who generally want to talk about how do

we dismantle structural barriers, right?

the opportunity, which I think is important.

And how do we, empower people, but on this particular issue, these

boundaries, which, whether it's, leftover from busing, it's crazy.

There's still stuff in federal policy, just on transportation

leftover from busing that makes it harder to do transportation

in, equitable and efficient ways.

these, leftover massive resistance, like all this stuff is now it's got a political

utility if you don't want choice.

And We don't talk about it.

Yeah.

I think these, cases, there's a number of like really important education cases that

we do not talk about enough that are, and Brown is this incredibly important case.

I don't mean to take anything away from that, but it's not the only sort

of seminal, education case of the 20th century, the very early part of the

21st, that helps create the contours of the, debate we have, and so I do think

we should talk about that, stuff more.

Now we talked earlier just how do we get this issue higher on our issues higher

on the radar screen with the Democratic Party and I just feel as though our lack

of policy imagination, Brandon Johnson is a part of an effort to erase all forms

of school choice and basically require people to go back to their neighborhoods.

That is exactly the same impulse that has resulted in so much

unfairness in our society.

And we don't have the policy proposals that directly, challenge him.

And with that being the case, we let him drive the narrative.

Yeah, look, to end on a happy note, I think the opening there is the theme

of the Democratic Party convention they kept coming back to is freedom.

Yeah.

And you can argue it's a pretty easy hole to poke.

you don't have to be, much of an analystist to point out like it's

if you're, if your theme is freedom and you're not doing something more

robust on school choice than what's on offer, then there's a disconnect.

That's like an obvious point, but I do think it starts to create an opening.

and as the parties redefine themselves to, your point on wanting to see

more, I think that is a thread to pull on what does freedom actually

look like in an educational context.

for families.

And right around when we're recording, it's, it's Jack Coons.

His birthday is 95, and he was dean of the law school at Berkeley.

Litigated Serrano.

He's a deeply wonderful person, deeply Catholic, and he believed that not all

Having parents having freedom like this just did violence to the idea of family.

and that's a, those are conversations.

So I think this freedom thread, that is a, thread to pull on and it's a more positive

thread on a range of issues, in terms of trying to expand access to opportunity.

this conversation has been an example of why I've been missing you over the summer.

I miss you too, Jed.

Look, I, you and I have been talking about it separately.

a new cadence for things.

I've got, some additional, content coming out at Charterfolk in the

first three weeks of the month.

And we're really going to try and anchor ourselves to a Walkie Folk

post, coming out, every fourth, week.

so I really look forward to that.

Yeah, we're going to do this more.

We'll get back on a more regular cadence and I'll give you the plug

that you won't give yourself the wonky folk or the, chart folk stuff.

It's just been great.

And the email is terrific and I would encourage people to sign up and

subscribe, if they can, it's a great way to Keep up on what's going on, but

also you highlight so many interesting leaders, either you highlighting them or

letting them talk in their own, voice.

And that's, I think, that's great.

No one else is, really doing that right now.

And I think it's a really valuable thing you're up to.

I appreciate you saying it.

Hey, good.

See you soon.

See you next month.

Take care.