Morrisey Requests Stay On Hope Scholarship Injunction

West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey filed a motion for a stay against a preliminary injunction on the Hope Scholarship with the state’s new Intermediate Court of Appeals.

Two weeks ago, Judge Joanna Tabit issued an injunction in Kanawha Circuit Court blocking the Hope Scholarship program. Morrisey is asking the court to allow the program to move forward, pending an appeal of the case on its merits.

“The lower court’s ruling undermining parents’ freedom to choose how they educate their children is legally wrong and deeply disappointing, and we are ready to appeal as soon as the lower court issues its written order confirming its ruling from nearly two weeks ago,” Morrisey said.

The Hope Scholarship provides parents with about $4,300 per child to educate their children however they choose. The state board of education and some parents argued the program was unconstitutional because it undermines the state’s financial obligation to provide a free education for residents.

In a statement, Morrisey said he asked for the stay to allow parents to receive the money they expected from the program, citing school’s start time in just a few weeks.

The legislature passed and the governor signed the Hope Scholarship Act into law in 2021.

Morrisey wrote in the motion that “absent a stay, the state and its families will suffer irreparable harm: a validly enacted law will stand mute because the Legislature’s policy judgments ‘troubled’ a single judge, and students across the state will be stripped of educational opportunities for at least a year.”

There was no immediate statement from the Intermediate Court of Appeals on when it would take up the request for a stay. The court just began operations on July 1.

Read a copy of the motion at: https://bit.ly/3uYLwpv.