Striking teachers in West Virginia celebrated on Tuesday as lawmakers rejected a bill that would have opened the first charter schools in the state as unions become more vocal about the public schools run by private groups.
The 53-45 vote by the House of Delegates effectively kills the legislation, which Governor Jim Justice, a Republican, had vowed to veto. The bill had passed the Republican-controlled Senate on Monday, prompting labor unions to call the strike, which closed most of the state’s 700 schools that serve 277,000 students.
Union leaders were due to hold a news conference later on Tuesday on the status of the strike.
