Georgia GOP Meets The Real Betsy DeVos

Some Georgian GOP politicians recently had a run-in with school choice politics Betsy DeVos style. Or as the lede at the Atlanta Journal-Constitution put it:

A national advocacy group promoting school vouchers bombarded conservative Georgia voters with glossy mailers tying Republican state legislators from their districts to Stacey Abrams and other “radical left” figures. It backfired in spectacular fashion.

The group is American Federation for Children, an ALEC-tied school choice advocacy group heavily funded by the DeVos money machine that has long been part of DeVos's political machine. They were trying to push the Georgian proposal for vouchers gussied up as "Promise Scholarships," and so they sent out flyers warning "the radical left want to cancel your right to choose your child's school" and the phone number of the local GOP legislator to call to pressure not to "give in to the radical left." "Stand up to them" it says under pictures of Stacey Abrams, Kamala Harris, and Joe Biden.

House Speaker David Ralston (GOP) had a few thoughts.

I am livid. I’ve been around politics for a long time, but this is the dumbest thing I’ve ever seen in my career and one of the most deceitful. These are people we have tried to help over the years, and they turned to attack us very viciously.

Also

That voucher legislation will not move at all in the Georgia House of Representatives this year, period.

What's most surprising about all of this is Ralston's surprise. Ralston may be livid, but I'm betting a few Michigan politicians could have told him-- the DeVos method of political armtwisting is a combination of "I gave you a bunch of money--now do as your told" and "If you won't, we'll just primary you out of there." As she wrote all the way back in 1997:

I have decided … to stop taking offense at the suggestion that we are buying influence. Now I simply concede the point. They are right. We do expect some things in return.

Her tenure at the Department of Education displayed more of what she had shown throughout her political advocacy career-- you are either a useful tool or not, and it would be a mistake to think you have any other sort of relationship with her. Get that Georgia GOP some coffee to sniff.