By admin 
PHOENIX (AZFamily) — Two Republican-backed measures have been removed from Arizona’s November ballot after separate Maricopa County judges ruled the measures violated the state constitution.
Read more ‘Wall of fire’: Farmer watches Arizona wildfire consume Colorado River bridge
The judges ruled the measures bundled together distinct constitutional changes, which denied voters the ability to weigh in on each issue independently.
School voucher measure struck down
The latest ruling blocks , a measure lawmakers said would protect school voucher money for military families. Judge Joseph Kreamer ruled that the protection was bundled with a provision that would have nullified future voter-approved voucher reforms.
Beth Lewis with Save Our Schools Arizona said those future reforms include their citizen-led ballot initiative, the Protect Education Act.
“It is a reform to the existing $1 billion voucher program,” Lewis said. “It does add additional requirements for safety for students, for academic accountability, for transparency of our taxpayer funds and for stopping waste, fraud and abuse of our tax dollars.”
School choice advocates push back
The American Federation for Children, an organization that advocates for school choice at the state and national level, said Arizona voters had shown interest in reasonable reforms to the ESA program.
But the organization’s press secretary, Brian Jodice, said the Protect Education Act goes further than reform.
“You’re talking about potentially taking this program away for 100,000 kids,” Jodice said. “It’s going to do real harm to the private schools that are on the program.”
Read more Douglas Port of Entry to reopen amid New World screwworm concerns
Second measure also removed
Earlier this week, a separate judge threw out , ruling it also illegally combined two issues into one — banning school districts from using public money or resources to support unions, and banning the state and local governments from entering collective bargaining agreements with any labor union.
The Arizona Education Association released a statement in response, saying, “The Superior Court struck down HCR2040, but the only way to protect educators is by changing leadership and putting pro-education candidates in office.”
Both measures were championed by Senate President Warren Peterson, who is running as the Republican nominee for the state’s top attorney position. Peterson did not respond to a request for comment.
An appeal on Wednesday’s ruling could still be possible, which means the final decision could still come before voters cast their ballots this fall.
See a spelling or grammatical error in our story? Please click here to report it.
Do you have a photo or video of a breaking news story? Send it to us here with a brief description.
Read more A-10 Warthog makes final flight out of Davis-Monthan Air Force Base