The Supreme Court split 4-4 on whether to approve the nation’s first publicly funded religious charter school on Thursday, leaving intact a lower ruling that voided the Oklahoma school’s contract.
“The judgment is affirmed by an equally divided court,” the court wrote in its one-sentence, unsigned opinion.
Only eight justices sat for the case since Justice Amy Coney Barrett recused.
The decision lets stand a ruling from the Oklahoma Supreme Court rejecting the bid to establish St. Isidore of Seville Catholic Virtual School, which spurred a major constitutional battle over the role of religion in state-funded education.