Gov. Sandoval Vetoes Close Enuf! Bill (AB456)

The Carson City press was understandably consumed yesterday with the details of the monumental budget deal that will end this legislative session on time, so it's only now that the Review-Journal is reporting what I Tweeted yesterday: Gov. Brian Sandoval yesterday vetoed the Close Enuf! bill. This was the odious measure, aka AB 456, was backed by every single Democrat that would have allowed some Nevada high school kids to graduate without passing all four of the required bare-minimum competency exams. The R-J's Ed Vogel wrote today that there's not enough State Senate support to override the veto, and thank goodness for that.

In his veto message, Sandoval explained:

"Although this bill may allow more students to graduate from high school, it represents diminished expectations for our students and lower standards for obtaining a high school diploma in Nevada. In my State of the State address, I said that our education system emphasizes too many of the wrong things. AB456 is another example of this paradigm and would send the wrong message to our students. I am committed to improving our education system and enhancing student achievement. Because this bill provides a way to hide or ignore a student's achievement problems rather than fix it, I veto it."

This outcome is especially satisfying because a source in Sandoval's office emailed me yesterday to tell me about the veto and to let me the governor had read my Las Vegas Weekly column vivisecting this legislation. In fact, I'm told, Sandoval was showing the piece to his aides and not the other way around.

I still baffle as to how any lawmaker can defend voting for this and still claim to be concerned about education.