Education Savings Accounts for Military Families Act of 2025

The Education Department would open an account for each approved child and put $6,000 in it the first year. Later years would rise with prices. Money would arrive in quarterly payments unless the parent picks another schedule.

The list is long. It covers private and religious school, online classes, tutoring, camps, textbooks, and computers. Therapy, exam fees, and college costs count too. So does money put into a state college savings plan.

The account itself would pay no federal income tax. The deposits and the money spent from it would not count as income for the child or the parent.

A lottery decides when there is not enough money for everyone. Siblings of current account holders come first. Children of enlisted members are next. Then come warrant officers, then commissioned officers.

A parent must sign an agreement not to enroll the child full time in a public school. If the child does enroll full time, the account closes.

A child with an account may not attend a public school part time for free. The parent and the school district would agree on a price, paid out of the account.

A first-time account requires the child to have been in a public school for 100 days in a row the year before. A family already homeschooling or paying for private school would have to return to public school first.

The Education Secretary could not shut a school out for being religious. Its faith, ties, or practices could not be held against it. Religious schools would be treated like any other provider.

States that take this federal education money would have to count a child with an account as meeting school attendance law. Parents would not face truancy trouble for keeping the child out of public school.

If someone sues to strike the program down under a state or federal constitution, parents in the program could join the case. A judge could cap how many join or require one shared brief.

Schools, tutors, and therapists paid from these accounts would follow only the rules in this bill. The money would count as help to the family, not to the school. So rules that ride along with federal funding would not attach.

A school taking account money would not have to change its creed, practices, admissions policy, or lessons. It could keep its own rules about which students it takes.

The Education Department, its contractors, and paid providers could not be sued only because account money changed hands. Other claims would still be possible.

The Education Department would set up a website and a phone line. People could report fraud in the program without giving their name.

The department would audit accounts at random, or every quarter or year, as needed. It could hire outside auditors to do the work.

A provider paid $100,000 or more from these accounts in a school year would post a surety bond. That is money held back to cover losses. The department would set the amount and the terms.

No federal or state agency could control or watch over any part of a paid provider. That covers private schools, religious schools, and home school providers.

A provider could sue over a department rule. The department would then have to prove the rule is needed. It would also have to show the rule is not too heavy a load.

The Secretary could take money from any other Education Department account. The goal would be to keep existing accounts full. The usual rules for shifting federal funds would not apply.