PHOENIX - Gov. Doug Ducey cannot deny COVID relief dollars to schools that impose mask mandates or give vouchers to parents so they can remove their children from those schools, a federal judge has concluded.
In a new ruling, Judge Steven Logan rejected the governor's argument that there is nothing in federal law that requires him to spend money from the American Rescue Plan Act only in ways that the federal agency and Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen say conform with ways the Centers for Disease Prevention and Control say will fight the virus.
And the judge had no more sympathy for the governor's argument that the rules the Treasury wrote for use of the dollars exceeded the agency's authority.
