By Andre Perry/The Hechinger Report
Universal pre-K, which was once considered a pipe dream for liberal Democrats, is coming closer to reality – because predominantly white conservatives in the deep red state of Alabama have decided to dream along with liberals. After decades of lobbying by early childhood advocates, local businessmen agreed to fund individual programs and initiatives, and used their influence with the staunchly Republican legislature to increase state spending on pre-K in 2012 by $9 million, up 47 percent from the year before. In the 2016-17 school year, that figure went up to $100 million. Now, the state is No. 1 in pre-K quality, according to The National Institute for Early Education Research, resulting from a change in mindset about a historically progressive issue.
My, how times have changed since when I worked in public schools in Louisiana! It was only 2014 when Bobby Jindal, then the Republican governor of that red state, stalled when he was offered $15 million in federal funds under the Obama administration to expand pre-K programs. Jindal eventually accepted the funds, but first he showed off his conservative bona fides by threatening to turn away money from a Democratic administration to fund a liberal priority. There seemed to be a dividing line that kept conservatives from transgressing in progressive territory.
Pre-K hasn’t been the only crossover issue. Last year, Republican legislators who vowed to dismantle the Affordable Care Act were put on the defensive by GOP supporters who demanded that their representatives instead maintain or improve upon the law. And in December, Congress passed a bipartisan criminal justice reform bill, the First Step Act, something that the Democratic Party has been trying to pass for decades. Yet universal pre-K, health care and criminal justice reform were once considered too liberal even for establishment Democrats to take up, for fear that it would turn off white working-class voters.
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Posted on April 8, 2019
