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What’s up this week at Oklahoma Policy Institute? The Weekly Wonk shares our most recent publications and other resources to help you stay informed about Oklahoma. Numbers of the Day and Policy Notes are from our daily news briefing, In The Know. Click here to subscribe to In The Know.
This Week from OK Policy
With immigration bills, lawmakers are playing politics with people’s lives: Instead of meaningfully addressing problems that Oklahomans face, lawmakers are once again choosing to target and criminalize our immigrant friends and neighbors for political gain. So far this session, legislators filed a flurry of anti-immigrant bills, such as House Bill 1362 and Senate Bill 868. These are harmful proposals that create a climate of fear in our state and would have a negative impact on all of our communities. [Gabriella Ramirez-Perez / OK Policy]
- Advocacy Alert: Tell Oklahoma lawmakers to vote NO on SB 868 that creates state overreach by preventing cities from protecting their residents.
- Advocacy Alert: Ask your Senator to vote NO on HB 1362, which would separate Oklahoma children from their parents.
The legislature is working against itself: Once again, the Legislature is ready to work against itself when it comes to Oklahoma’s criminal justice system. The Legislature has advanced some bills that will remove barriers placed on justice-involved people. However, it has also entertained a number of bills that needlessly increase punitive measures. The Legislature risks setting Oklahoma back as the number one incarcerator in the country. Fortunately, there is still plenty of time for lawmakers to break this cycle and move Oklahoma in the right direction. [Cole Allen / OK Policy]
Policy Matters: State leaders, are you listening?: Many Oklahoma families are struggling right now, but you might not know it from listening to some of our elected leaders. In the past two weeks alone, some politicians have shown how disconnected they are from everyday Oklahomans’ financial hardships. [Shiloh Kantz / The Journal Record]
Oklahoma Death Penalty Tracker: Oklahoma has executed more than 125 people since the modern era of capital punishment began in 1976, which is by far the nation’s highest per capita rate for executions. Given the prevalence of capital punishment in our state and the increasing scrutiny surrounding the process, the Oklahoma Policy Institute has published the Oklahoma Death Penalty Tracker. This online tool compiles information on all active death row cases since 2021, the end of a recent unofficial moratorium. [Andrew Bell / OK Policy]
Weekly What’s That
The Housing Choice Voucher Program is a federally funded program that assists low-income households afford housing on the private market. Local public housing agencies receive funding from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and administer the vouchers in local communities.
Eligible households are responsible for finding their own housing, but the rental unit must meet health and safety standards. The local public housing agency pays the landlord directly, and the voucher holder is responsible for paying the difference between the subsidy and actual rent. Voucher holders must contribute 30 percent of their monthly adjusted gross income to rent and utilities.
Income requirements for housing vouchers are set by the local agencies and vary by location and family size. By federal law, housing agencies must provide 75 percent of its vouchers to households whose income does not exceed 30 percent of the area median income. The rest may go to households with incomes up to 80 percent of the area median income.
Housing Choice Vouchers are typically used for rent, but may be used to purchase a home if the local public housing agency has a homeownership program.
Look up more key terms to understand Oklahoma politics and government here.
Quote of the Week
“There is no safeguard in place to ensure that students across the U.S. will earn comparable educations. Each state will be left to their own whims when it comes to spending any federal funds that might still exist. There will be no standard set of guidelines or expectations. We are led by people who are focused on ‘rights,’ but have forgotten the ‘responsibility’ or who have misplaced that word in their vocabulary.”
– Christie Cannon, a Sand Springs middle-school art teacher, expressing concern about how federal money meant for individual schools, classrooms and/or students will reach its destination without the federal Education Department, and about who will monitor the overall quality of education from state to state. [The Oklahoman]
Op-Ed of the Week
Opinion: Oklahoma lawmakers are attacking direct democracy; time to fight back
Oklahoma’s constitution guarantees citizens the right to petition their government, giving the people a direct voice in shaping policy when elected leaders fail to act. But over the past several years, the Legislature has systematically chipped away at this right, making it harder and harder for citizen-led initiatives to reach the ballot.
Now, with Senate Bill 1027, lawmakers are launching one of the most aggressive attacks yet on the petition process — limiting voter participation, adding bureaucratic red tape and making it nearly impossible for grassroots movements to succeed.
[Read the full op-ed by Dr. Kenneth Setter from Tulsa World]
Numbers of the Week
- 47% – Nearly half of U.S. adults (47%) say the way people behave in public these days is ruder than before the COVID-19 pandemic. That includes 20% who say behavior today is a lot ruder. [Pew Research]
- 11.4% – The rate of Oklahomans without health insurance in 2023. Oklahoma’s uninsured rate has dropped in recent years thanks in large measure to expansion of Medicaid coverage to low-income residents. [U.S. Census via OK Policy]
- 17.2% – Share of Oklahoma public school students who have an Individualized Education Program (IEP). Under federal law, public schools must provide children with qualifying disabilities the supports they need to make meaningful academic progress in the least restrictive learning environment. These specific supports are mapped by teachers, administrators, and parents in each child’s IEP. [US Department of Education, Office of Special Education Programs via Urban Institute]
- 352,998 – In 2022, the Oklahoma Child Tax Credit was claimed on 352,998 Oklahoma tax returns for a total amount of $42.6 million, according to the Oklahoma Tax Commission. [2023-2024 Tax Expenditure Report]
- $2.3 billion – State revenues would be expected to decline $2.3 billion over the next 10 years if federal lawmakers pass the Educational Choice for Children Act of 2025 (ECCA). State revenues would be decreased due to tax breaks given to the wealthy donors funding organizations that give out private school vouchers. [Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy]
What We’re Reading
- Large Majorities Don’t Want Cuts to Medicaid Funding, Including Most Trump Voters and Rural Residents: Amid discussion of changes to the Medicaid program, most of the public say that Medicaid is important to their local communities. About two in ten favor cuts to Medicaid spending. Support for Medicaid cuts remains low even among typically conservative groups such as Republicans, Trump voters, and those living in rural communities. The poll also gauges the impact of arguments for and against Medicaid work requirements and reductions to federal spending on ACA expansion. [KFF]
- Congressional Republicans Can’t Cut Medicaid by Hundreds of Billions Without Hurting People: Medicaid is a popular program that provides essential health care for 72 million people. The majority of U.S. adults across party affiliations oppose cuts to Medicaid. Nevertheless, Republicans in Congress want to pass deep and damaging cuts to Medicaid to pay for tax cuts for wealthy people as part of their budget legislation. This has led to enormous pushback, and some Republicans are now claiming their changes would not hurt eligible people who are enrolled in Medicaid to receive the health care they need. This is false. Republicans’ push to cut Medicaid by hundreds of billions of dollars has led them to consider a set of policies that would, indeed, harm Medicaid enrollees. [Center for Budget and Policy Priorities]
- How Dismantling the Education Department Could Affect Disabled Students across the US: Now, disabled students’ right to public education is at risk. The Trump administration says it plans to close the US Department of Education (ED), revisiting efforts that began in the president’s first term. Though the executive branch cannot dismantle the Department of Education or alter federal funding without congressional approval, it could significantly disrupt two of the department’s key functions. Dismantling the department and disrupting these functions could have devastating effects for public school students with disabilities across the US. [Urban Institute]
- Red States Embrace the Idea of Child Tax Credits: If an Ohio measure for a state child tax credit passes, it would mark the first time a Republican-controlled state has implemented a refundable child tax credit. Advocates view that type of credit as key because it delivers cash even to poor families with little or no income tax liability. State interest in creating or expanding child tax credits boomed after the pandemic-era expansion of the federal child tax credit delivered cash directly to millions. That move quickly lifted millions of children out of poverty. But the expanded tax credit expired in 2021 — leading to a doubling in the nation’s childhood poverty rate in 2022. [Governing]
- Shelter Skelter: How the Educational Choice for Children Act Would Use Tax Avoidance to Fuel School Privatization: The Educational Choice for Children Act of 2025 (ECCA) would ostensibly provide a tax break on charitable donations to organizations that give out private K-12 school vouchers. Most of the so-called “contributions,” however, would be made by wealthy people solely for the tax savings, as those savings would typically be larger than their contributions. ITEP estimates that ECCA would spur $126 billion in contributions to private school voucher funds over the next 10 years but would cost the U.S. Treasury more than that—$134 billion—because the tax subsidies being paid out would exceed the contributions made to these funds. Most states would automatically provide additional tax breaks on top of those offered by the federal government, bringing the total loss to public budgets to over $136 billion. In effect, ECCA seeks to harness wealthy families’ interest in tax avoidance and personal profit as a means of bolstering private schools at the expense of public budgets. [Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy]
