A new Suffolk University/Arizona Republic poll shows that the ballot language of Proposition 305 has led to a great deal of confusion among Arizona voters. With the proposition to help decide the state’s future in the expanded universal voucher program, the confusion would result in the November election’s outcome being affected. 

41 percent of the poll’s 500 registered voters were in support of expanding the voucher program that provides public money to parents in order to send their children to private school. 32 percent were opposed and 27 percent remain undecided on the subject.

The poll, along with additional interviews, allowed researchers to learn that a great deal of the surveyed voters remain confused about what kind of influence the ballot measure would have.

While the 2017 voucher expansion that Proposition 305 would keep in place or repeal was opposed by every Democrat within the Legislature, 51 percent of Democratic voters expressed in the poll that they would vote in support of the expansion.

When it came to Republicans, the voter expansion was pushed for at the Legislature, but only 29 percent of Republican voters indicated in the poll that they would vote yes for the proposition.

After The Arizona Republic contacted three voters, a Democrat, a Republican and an independent, the ballot measure was clarified and led to each voter saying they would change their stance on the proposition. 

Proposition 305 asks voters whether they want to keep or repeal the 2017 expansion of the Empowerment Scholarship Account program, which expanded the program to all public school students but capped it at 30,000 students. About 5,000 students currently have ESA accounts.

 A “yes” vote keeps the expansion, while a “no” vote overturns it.