WASHINGTON – House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has reneged on a bipartisan deal to include the Student Empowerment Act as a provision in the SECURE Act (H.R. 1994) after facing pressure from radical anti-family special interest groups. The Student Empowerment Act would significantly expand families’ access to tax-advantaged 529 plans, allowing the savings accounts to be utilized not only for higher education, trade schools, and vocational schools, but also for K-12 expenses for public schooling, private schooling, and homeschooling.

Terry Schilling, executive director at American Principles Project, released the following statement responding to the news:

Congress had the opportunity to provide millions of families with needed relief from rising education costs by expanding access to tax-advantaged 529 education savings accounts. A bipartisan deal had been reached to get this done, until Speaker Pelosi killed the whole thing after hearing opposition from a few special interest groups — groups that happen to contribute millions of dollars to the Democrats’ campaign coffers each election cycle.

It’s pretty obvious who Nancy Pelosi works for, and it’s certainly not hard-working parents who just want to provide for their kids’ education. Supporting parents by helping them save money for their kids’ education costs is a no-brainer if you care about helping families — apparently, the Democrats don’t care about that.

Once again the Democrats are waging war on the family. That’s a bold strategy. Let’s see if it pays off for them in 2020.

American Principles Project is urging the U.S. Senate Finance Committee to include the previously agreed upon Student Empowerment Act provision in the Senate version of the bill, S. 972, the Retirement Enhancing and Savings Act.

To schedule an interview with Terry Schilling, contact Paul Dupont at (o) 202-503-2010 or pdupont@americanprinciplesproject.org.