Arizona State Treasurer Kimberly Yee Wins GOP Nomination for Superintendent of Public Instruction

In a closely watched Republican primary, state Treasurer Kimberly Yee (R-AZ) has defeated incumbent Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Horne (R-AZ) in a race that turned almost entirely on a single question: how much oversight should the state have over its billion-dollar school voucher program?

For further context, the superintendent of public instruction oversees Arizona's education department, administers state education policy, and manages teacher certifications, making the role central to how the state's ongoing school choice debate plays out in practice.

Now, Yee secured the Republican nomination Wednesday, ending what had been a competitive campaign between two Republicans who largely agreed on the value of Arizona's Empowerment Scholarship Account (ESA) program but clashed sharply over how it should be managed.

The ESA program, which allows families to use roughly $7,400 in state funds per student for private school tuition or homeschool expenses, has grown dramatically since 2022, when universal eligibility was signed into law.

Enrollment has grown from about 12,000 students to nearly 100,000, pushing the program's annual cost to approximately $1 billion.

Horne, a longtime supporter of the program, argued his office had simply been doing its job, identifying purchases made with voucher funds that weren't related to education.

Yee Prevails

Yee and her allies in the Arizona Legislature's Freedom Caucus took a different view.

They argued Horne had gone beyond his legal authority in regulating how families spent their voucher funds and characterized his approach as government overreach. Yee ultimately prevailed, earning the Republican nomination.

Yee, who is termed out as state treasurer after eight years in that role and previously served multiple terms in the state legislature, will now face Democrat Teresa Leyba Ruiz (D-AZ) in November.

Leyba Ruiz, a former Glendale Community College president, won her party's primary over Brett Newby.

With the primary now decided, the November matchup between Yee and Leyba Ruiz sets up a notable contrast between two candidates with very different visions for how Arizona's education system and its school choice program should be run.