Attorney General Gentner Drummond, also a Republican, sued to stop the school. He called the 4-4 vote “a resounding victory for religious liberty” that also will ensure that “Oklahoma taxpayers will not be forced to fund radical Islamic schools, while protecting the religious rights of families to choose any school they wish for their children.”

The U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday blocked a bid led by two Catholic dioceses to establish in Oklahoma the nation's first taxpayer-funded religious charter school in a major case involving religious rights in American education.

The high court’s decision avoids setting precedent but allows a lower court’s ruling barring the school to stand.