I
119THCONGRESS
1
STSESSION H. R. 817
To amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to allow a credit against
tax for charitable donations to nonprofit organizations providing edu-
cation scholarships to qualified elementary and secondary students.
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
JANUARY28, 2025
Mr. S
MITHof Nebraska (for himself, Mr. OWENS, Mr. WALBERG, Mr. KELLY
of Pennsylvania, Mr. Y
AKYM, Mr. LAHOOD, Ms. LETLOW, Mrs. MILLER-
M
EEKS, Mr. DONALDS, Ms. TENNEY, Mr. FEENSTRA, Mr. MOOREof
Utah, Mr. H
ERNof Oklahoma, Ms. MALLIOTAKIS, Mr. LAWLER, Mr.
F
ONG, Mr. CAREY, Mr. HUDSON, Ms. SALAZAR, Mr. SCOTTFRANKLIN
of Florida, Mr. C
RENSHAW, Mr. WILSONof South Carolina, Mr. ROSE,
Mr. W
EBERof Texas, Mr. CISCOMANI, Mr. MOOLENAAR, Mr. ALLEN,
and Mr. D
UNNof Florida) introduced the following bill; which was re-
ferred to the Committee on Ways and Means, and in addition to the
Committee on Education and Workforce, for a period to be subsequently
determined by the Speaker, in each case for consideration of such provi-
sions as fall within the jurisdiction of the committee concerned
A BILL
To amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to allow a
credit against tax for charitable donations to nonprofit
organizations providing education scholarships to quali-
fied elementary and secondary students.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa-1
tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 2
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SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 1
This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Educational Choice 2
for Children Act of 2025’’. 3
SEC. 2. TAX CREDIT FOR CONTRIBUTIONS OF INDIVIDUALS 4
TO SCHOLARSHIP GRANTING ORGANIZA-5
TIONS. 6
(a) A
LLOWANCE OFCREDIT.— 7
(1) I
N GENERAL.—Subpart A of part IV of sub-8
chapter A of chapter 1 of the Internal Revenue Code 9
of 1986 is amended by inserting after section 25E 10
the following new section: 11
‘‘SEC. 25F. QUALIFIED ELEMENTARY AND SECONDARY EDU-12
CATION SCHOLARSHIPS. 13
‘‘(a) A
LLOWANCE OFCREDIT.—In the case of an in-14
dividual, there shall be allowed as a credit against the tax 15
imposed by this chapter for the taxable year an amount 16
equal to the aggregate amount of qualified contributions 17
made by the taxpayer during the taxable year. 18
‘‘(b) L
IMITATIONS.— 19
‘‘(1) I
N GENERAL.—The credit allowed under 20
subsection (a) to any taxpayer for any taxable year 21
shall not exceed an amount equal to the greater of— 22
‘‘(A) 10 percent of the adjusted gross in-23
come of the taxpayer for the taxable year, or 24
‘‘(B) $5,000. 25
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‘‘(2) ALLOCATION OF VOLUME CAP .—The credit 1
allowed under subsection (a) to any taxpayer for any 2
taxable year shall not exceed the amount of the vol-3
ume cap allocated by the Secretary to such taxpayer 4
under subsection (g) with respect to qualified con-5
tributions made by the taxpayer during the taxable 6
year. 7
‘‘(3) R
EDUCTION BASED ON STATE CREDIT .— 8
The amount allowed as a credit under subsection (a) 9
for a taxable year shall be reduced by the amount 10
allowed as a credit on any State tax return of the 11
taxpayer for qualified contributions made by the tax-12
payer during the taxable year. 13
‘‘(c) D
EFINITIONS.—For purposes of this section— 14
‘‘(1) E
LIGIBLE STUDENT.—The term ‘eligible 15
student’ means an individual who— 16
‘‘(A) is a member of a household with an 17
income which is not greater than 300 percent 18
of the area median gross income (as such term 19
is used in section 42), and 20
‘‘(B) is eligible to enroll in a public ele-21
mentary or secondary school. 22
‘‘(2) Q
UALIFIED CONTRIBUTION .—The term 23
‘qualified contribution’ means a charitable contribu-24
tion (as defined by section 170(c)) to a scholarship 25
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granting organization in the form of cash or market-1
able securities. 2
‘‘(3) Q
UALIFIED ELEMENTARY OR SECONDARY 3
EDUCATION EXPENSE .—The term ‘qualified elemen-4
tary or secondary education expense’ means the fol-5
lowing expenses in connection with enrollment or at-6
tendance at, or for students enrolled at or attending, 7
an elementary or secondary public, private, or reli-8
gious school: 9
‘‘(A) Tuition. 10
‘‘(B) Curriculum and curricular materials. 11
‘‘(C) Books or other instructional mate-12
rials. 13
‘‘(D) Online educational materials. 14
‘‘(E) Tuition for tutoring or educational 15
classes outside of the home, including at a tu-16
toring facility, but only if the tutor or instruc-17
tor is not related to the student and— 18
‘‘(i) is licensed as a teacher in any 19
State, 20
‘‘(ii) has taught at an eligible edu-21
cational institution, or 22
‘‘(iii) is a subject matter expert in the 23
relevant subject. 24
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‘‘(F) Fees for a nationally standardized 1
norm-referenced achievement test, an advanced 2
placement examination, or any examinations re-3
lated to college or university admission. 4
‘‘(G) Fees for dual enrollment in an insti-5
tution of higher education. 6
‘‘(H) Educational therapies for students 7
with disabilities provided by a licensed or ac-8
credited practitioner or provider, including oc-9
cupational, behavioral, physical, and speech-lan-10
guage therapies. 11
Such term shall include expenses for the purposes 12
described in subparagraphs (A) through (H) in con-13
nection with a homeschool (whether treated as a 14
homeschool or a private school for purposes of appli-15
cable State law). 16
‘‘(4) S
CHOLARSHIP GRANTING ORGANIZA -17
TION.—The term ‘scholarship granting organization’ 18
means any organization— 19
‘‘(A) which— 20
‘‘(i) is described in section 501(c)(3) 21
and exempt from tax under section 501(a), 22
and 23
‘‘(ii) is not a private foundation, 24
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‘‘(B) substantially all of the activities of 1
which are providing scholarships for qualified 2
elementary or secondary education expenses of 3
eligible students, 4
‘‘(C) which prevents the co-mingling of 5
qualified contributions with other amounts by 6
maintaining one or more separate accounts ex-7
clusively for qualified contributions, and 8
‘‘(D) which either— 9
‘‘(i) meets the requirements of sub-10
section (d), or 11
‘‘(ii) pursuant to State law, was able 12
(as of the date of the enactment of this 13
section) to receive contributions that are 14
eligible for a State tax credit if such con-15
tributions are used by the organization to 16
provide scholarships to individual elemen-17
tary and secondary students, including 18
scholarships for attending private schools. 19
‘‘(d) R
EQUIREMENTS FOR SCHOLARSHIPGRANTING 20
O
RGANIZATIONS.— 21
‘‘(1) I
N GENERAL.—An organization meets the 22
requirements of this subsection if— 23
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‘‘(A) such organization provides scholar-1
ships to 2 or more students, provided that not 2
all such students attend the same school, 3
‘‘(B) such organization does not provide 4
scholarships for any expenses other than quali-5
fied elementary or secondary education ex-6
penses, 7
‘‘(C) such organization provides a scholar-8
ship to eligible students with a priority for— 9
‘‘(i) students awarded a scholarship 10
the previous school year, and 11
‘‘(ii) after application of clause (i), 12
any such students who have a sibling who 13
was awarded a scholarship from such orga-14
nization, 15
‘‘(D) such organization does not earmark 16
or set aside contributions for scholarships on 17
behalf of any particular student, 18
‘‘(E) such organization takes appropriate 19
steps to verify the annual household income and 20
family size of eligible students to whom it 21
awards scholarships, and limits them to a mem-22
ber of a household for which the income does 23
not exceed the amount established under sub-24
section (c)(1)(A), 25
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‘‘(F) such organization— 1
‘‘(i) obtains from an independent cer-2
tified public accountant annual financial 3
and compliance audits, and 4
‘‘(ii) certifies to the Secretary (at such 5
time, and in such form and manner, as the 6
Secretary may prescribe) that the audit de-7
scribed in clause (i) has been completed, 8
and 9
‘‘(G) no officer or board member of such 10
organization has been convicted of a felony. 11
‘‘(2) I
NCOME VERIFICATION.—For purposes of 12
paragraph (1)(E), review of all of the following (as 13
applicable) shall be treated as satisfying the require-14
ment to take appropriate steps to verify annual 15
household income: 16
‘‘(A) Federal and State income tax returns 17
or tax return transcripts with applicable sched-18
ules for the taxable year prior to application. 19
‘‘(B) Income reporting statements for tax 20
purposes or wage and income transcripts from 21
the Internal Revenue Service. 22
‘‘(C) Notarized income verification letter 23
from employers. 24
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‘‘(D) Unemployment or workers compensa-1
tion statements. 2
‘‘(E) Budget letters regarding public as-3
sistance payments and Supplemental Nutrition 4
Assistance Program (SNAP) payments includ-5
ing a list of household members. 6
‘‘(3) I
NDEPENDENT CERTIFIED PUBLIC AC -7
COUNTANT.—For purposes of paragraph (1)(F), the 8
term ‘independent certified public accountant’ 9
means, with respect to an organization, a certified 10
public accountant who is not a person described in 11
section 465(b)(3)(A) with respect to such organiza-12
tion or any employee of such organization. 13
‘‘(4) P
ROHIBITION ON SELF-DEALING.— 14
‘‘(A) I
N GENERAL.—A scholarship grant-15
ing organization may not award a scholarship 16
to any disqualified person. 17
‘‘(B) D
ISQUALIFIED PERSON .—For pur-18
poses of this paragraph, a disqualified person 19
shall be determined pursuant to rules similar to 20
the rules of section 4946. 21
‘‘(e) D
ENIAL OFDOUBLEBENEFIT.—Any qualified 22
contribution for which a credit is allowed under this sec-23
tion shall not be taken into account as a charitable con-24
tribution for purposes of section 170. 25
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‘‘(f) CARRYFORWARD OF UNUSEDCREDIT.— 1
‘‘(1) I
N GENERAL.—If the credit allowable 2
under subsection (a) for any taxable year exceeds 3
the limitation imposed by section 26(a) for such tax-4
able year reduced by the sum of the credits allowable 5
under this subpart (other than this section, section 6
23, and section 25D), such excess shall be carried to 7
the succeeding taxable year and added to the credit 8
allowable under subsection (a) for such taxable year. 9
‘‘(2) L
IMITATION.—No credit may be carried 10
forward under this subsection to any taxable year 11
following the fifth taxable year after the taxable year 12
in which the credit arose. For purposes of the pre-13
ceding sentence, credits shall be treated as used on 14
a first-in first-out basis. 15
‘‘(g) V
OLUMECAP.— 16
‘‘(1) I
N GENERAL.—The volume cap applicable 17
under this section shall be $5,000,000,000 for each 18
of calendar years 2025 through 2028, and zero for 19
calendar years thereafter. Such amount shall be allo-20
cated by the Secretary as provided in paragraph (2) 21
to taxpayers with respect to qualified contributions 22
made by such taxpayers, except that 10 percent of 23
such amount shall be divided evenly among the 24
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States, and shall be available with respect to individ-1
uals residing in such States. 2
‘‘(2) F
IRST-COME, FIRST-SERVE.—For purposes 3
of applying the volume cap under this section, such 4
volume cap for any calendar year shall be allocated 5
by the Secretary on a first-come, first-serve basis, as 6
determined based on the time (during such calendar 7
year) at which the taxpayer made the qualified con-8
tribution with respect to which the allocation is 9
made. The Secretary shall not make any allocation 10
of volume cap for any calendar year after December 11
31 of such calendar year. 12
‘‘(3) R
EAL-TIME INFORMATION.—For purposes 13
of this section, the Secretary shall develop a system 14
to track the amount of qualified contributions made 15
during the calendar year for which a credit may be 16
claimed under this section, with such information to 17
be updated in real time. 18
‘‘(4) A
NNUAL INCREASES.— 19
‘‘(A) I
N GENERAL.—In the case of the cal-20
endar year after a high use calendar year, the 21
dollar amount otherwise in effect under sub-22
section (a) for such calendar year shall be equal 23
to 105 percent of the dollar amount in effect 24
for such high use calendar year. 25
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‘‘(B) HIGH USE CALENDAR YEAR .—For 1
purposes of this subsection, the term ‘high use 2
calendar year’ means any calendar year for 3
which 90 percent or more of the volume cap in 4
effect for such calendar year under subsection 5
(a) is allocated to taxpayers. 6
‘‘(C) P
REVENTION OF DECREASES IN AN -7
NUAL VOLUME CAP .—The volume cap in effect 8
under subsection (a) for any calendar year shall 9
not be less than the volume cap in effect under 10
such subsection for the preceding calendar year. 11
‘‘(D) P
UBLICATION OF ANNUAL VOLUME 12
CAP.—The Secretary shall make publicly avail-13
able the dollar amount of the volume cap in ef-14
fect under subsection (a) for each calendar 15
year. 16
‘‘(5) S
TATES.—For purposes of this subsection, 17
the term ‘State’ includes the District of Columbia.’’. 18
(2) C
ONFORMING AMENDMENTS .— 19
(A) Section 25(e)(1)(C) of such Code is 20
amended by striking ‘‘and 25D’’ and inserting 21
‘‘25D, and 25F’’. 22
(B) The table of sections for subpart A of 23
part IV of subchapter A of chapter 1 of such 24
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Code is amended by inserting after the item re-1
lating to section 25E the following new item: 2
‘‘Sec. 25F. Qualified elementary and secondary education scholarships.’’.
(b) FAILURE OFSCHOLARSHIPGRANTINGORGANI-3
ZATIONSTOMAKEDISTRIBUTIONS.— 4
(1) I
N GENERAL.—Chapter 42 of such Code is 5
amended by adding at the end the following new 6
subchapter: 7
‘‘Subchapter I—Scholarship Granting 8
Organizations 9
‘‘Sec. 4969. Failure to distribute receipts.
‘‘SEC. 4969. FAILURE TO DISTRIBUTE RECEIPTS.
10
‘‘(a) I
NGENERAL.—In the case of any scholarship 11
granting organization (as defined in section 25F) which 12
has been determined by the Secretary to have failed to 13
satisfy the requirement under subsection (b) for any tax-14
able year, any contribution made to such organization dur-15
ing the first taxable year beginning after the date of such 16
determination shall not be treated as a qualified contribu-17
tion (as defined in section 25F(c)(2)) for purposes of sec-18
tion 25F. 19
‘‘(b) R
EQUIREMENT.—The requirement described in 20
this subsection is that the amount of receipts of the schol-21
arship granting organization for the taxable year which 22
are distributed before the distribution deadline with re-23
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spect to such receipts shall not be less than the required 1
distribution amount with respect to such taxable year. 2
‘‘(c) D
EFINITIONS.—For purposes of this section— 3
‘‘(1) R
EQUIRED DISTRIBUTION AMOUNT .— 4
‘‘(A) I
N GENERAL.—The required distribu-5
tion amount with respect to a taxable year is 6
the amount equal to 100 percent of the total re-7
ceipts of the scholarship granting organization 8
for such taxable year— 9
‘‘(i) reduced by the sum of such re-10
ceipts that are retained for reasonable ad-11
ministrative expenses for the taxable year 12
or are carried to the succeeding taxable 13
year under subparagraph (C), and 14
‘‘(ii) increased by the amount of the 15
carryover under subparagraph (C) from 16
the preceding taxable year. 17
‘‘(B) S
AFE HARBOR FOR REASONABLE AD -18
MINISTRATIVE EXPENSES .—For purposes of 19
subparagraph (A)(i), if the percentage of total 20
receipts of a scholarship granting organization 21
for a taxable year which are used for adminis-22
trative purposes is equal to or less than 10 per-23
cent, such expenses shall be deemed to be rea-24
sonable for purposes of such subparagraph. 25
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‘‘(C) CARRYOVER.—With respect to the 1
amount of the total receipts of a scholarship 2
granting organization with respect to any tax-3
able year, an amount not greater than 15 per-4
cent of such amount may, at the election of 5
such organization, be carried to the succeeding 6
taxable year. 7
‘‘(2) D
ISTRIBUTIONS.—The term ‘distribution’ 8
includes amounts which are formally committed but 9
not distributed. A formal commitment described in 10
the preceding sentence may include contributions set 11
aside for eligible students for more than one year. 12
‘‘(3) D
ISTRIBUTION DEADLINE .—The distribu-13
tion deadline with respect to receipts for a taxable 14
year is the first day of the third taxable year fol-15
lowing the taxable year in which such receipts are 16
received by the scholarship granting organization.’’. 17
(2) C
LERICAL AMENDMENT .—The table of sub-18
chapters for chapter 42 of such Code is amended by 19
adding at the end the following new item: 20
‘‘SUBCHAPTER I. SCHOLARSHIP GRANTING ORGANIZATIONS ’’.
(c) EFFECTIVEDATE.—The amendments made by 21
this section shall apply to taxable years ending after De-22
cember 31, 2024. 23
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SEC. 3. EXEMPTION FROM GROSS INCOME FOR SCHOLAR-1
SHIPS FOR QUALIFIED ELEMENTARY OR SEC-2
ONDARY EDUCATION EXPENSES OF ELIGIBLE 3
STUDENTS. 4
(a) I
NGENERAL.—Part III of subchapter B of chap-5
ter 1 of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 is amended 6
by inserting before section 140 the following new section: 7
‘‘SEC. 139J. SCHOLARSHIPS FOR QUALIFIED ELEMENTARY 8
OR SECONDARY EDUCATION EXPENSES OF 9
ELIGIBLE STUDENTS. 10
‘‘(a) I
NGENERAL.—In the case of an individual, 11
gross income shall not include any amounts provided to 12
any dependent of such individual pursuant to a scholar-13
ship for qualified elementary or secondary education ex-14
penses of an eligible student which is provided by a schol-15
arship granting organization. 16
‘‘(b) D
EFINITIONS.—In this section, the terms ‘quali-17
fied elementary or secondary education expense’, ‘eligible 18
student’, and ‘scholarship granting organization’ have the 19
same meaning given such terms under section 25F(c).’’. 20
(b) C
ONFORMINGAMENDMENT.—The table of sec-21
tions for part III of subchapter B of chapter 1 of the In-22
ternal Revenue Code of 1986 is amended by inserting be-23
fore the item relating to section 140 the following new 24
item: 25
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‘‘Sec. 139J. Scholarships for qualified elementary or secondary education ex-
penses of eligible students.’’.
(c) EFFECTIVEDATE.—The amendments made by 1
this section shall apply to amounts received after Decem-2
ber 31, 2024, in taxable years ending after such date. 3
SEC. 4. ORGANIZATIONAL AND PARENTAL AUTONOMY. 4
(a) P
ROHIBITION OFCONTROLOVERSCHOLARSHIP 5
O
RGANIZATIONS.— 6
(1) I
N GENERAL.— 7
(A) T
REATMENT.—A scholarship granting 8
organization shall not, by virtue of participation 9
under any provision of this Act or any amend-10
ment made by this Act, be regarded as acting 11
on behalf of any governmental entity. 12
(B) N
O GOVERNMENTAL CONTROL .—Noth-13
ing in this Act, or any amendment made by this 14
Act, shall be construed to permit, allow, encour-15
age, or authorize any Federal, State, or local 16
government entity, or officer or employee there-17
of, to mandate, direct, or control any aspect of 18
any scholarship granting organization. 19
(C) M
AXIMUM FREEDOM .—To the extent 20
permissible by law, this Act, and any amend-21
ment made by this Act, shall be construed to 22
allow scholarship granting organizations max-23
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imum freedom to provide for the needs of the 1
participants without governmental control. 2
(2) P
ROHIBITION OF CONTROL OVER NON -PUB-3
LIC SCHOOLS.— 4
(A) N
O GOVERNMENTAL CONTROL .—Noth-5
ing in this Act, or any amendment made by this 6
Act, shall be construed to permit, allow, encour-7
age, or authorize any Federal, State, or local 8
government entity, or officer or employee there-9
of, to mandate, direct, or control any aspect of 10
any private or religious elementary or secondary 11
education institution. 12
(B) N
O EXCLUSION OF PRIVATE OR RELI -13
GIOUS SCHOOLS.—No Federal, State, or local 14
government entity, or officer or employee there-15
of, shall impose or permit the imposition of any 16
conditions or requirements that would exclude 17
or operate to exclude educational expenses at 18
private or religious elementary and secondary 19
education institutions from being considered 20
qualified elementary or secondary education ex-21
penses. 22
(C) N
O EXCLUSION OF QUALIFIED EX -23
PENSES DUE TO INSTITUTION ’S RELIGIOUS 24
CHARACTER OR AFFILIATION .—No Federal, 25
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State, or local government entity, or officer or 1
employee thereof, shall exclude, discriminate 2
against, or otherwise disadvantage any elemen-3
tary or secondary education institution with re-4
spect to qualified elementary or secondary edu-5
cation expenses at that institution based in 6
whole or in part on the institution’s religious 7
character or affiliation, including religiously 8
based or mission-based policies or practices. 9
(3) P
ARENTAL RIGHTS TO USE SCHOLAR -10
SHIPS.—No Federal, State, or local government en-11
tity, or officer or employee thereof, shall disfavor or 12
discourage the use of scholarships granted by par-13
ticipating scholarship granting organizations for 14
qualified elementary or secondary education ex-15
penses at private or nonprofit elementary and sec-16
ondary education institutions, including faith-based 17
schools. 18
(4) P
ARENTAL RIGHT TO INTERVENE .—In any 19
action filed in any State or Federal court which 20
challenges the constitutionality (under the constitu-21
tion of such State or the Constitution of the United 22
States) of any provision of this Act (or any amend-23
ment made by this Act), any parent of an eligible 24
student who has received a scholarship from a schol-25
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arship granting organization shall have the right to 1
intervene in support of the constitutionality of such 2
provision or amendment. To avoid duplication of ef-3
forts and reduce the burdens placed on the parties 4
to the action, the court in any such action may re-5
quire interveners taking similar positions to file joint 6
papers or to be represented by a single attorney at 7
oral argument, provided that the court does not re-8
quire such interveners to join any brief filed on be-9
half of any State which is a defendant in such ac-10
tion. 11
(b) D
EFINITIONS.—For purposes of this section, the 12
terms ‘‘eligible student’’, ‘‘scholarship granting organiza-13
tion’’, and ‘‘qualified elementary or secondary education 14
expense’’ shall have the same meanings given such terms 15
under section 25F(c) of the Internal Revenue Code of 16
1986 (as added by section 2(a) of this Act). 17
Æ
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kjohnson on DSK7ZCZBW3PROD with $$_JOB