The Trump administration on Tuesday announced plans to shift key functions from the Education Department to other corners of the federal government, moving quickly to implement changes just one day after the Supreme Court cleared the way for mass layoffs.
The department’s main purpose has been to distribute money to college students through grants and loans, to send federal money to K-12 schools, particularly for low-income and disabled students, and to enforce anti-discrimination laws. But soon after President Trump’s return to the White House, he signed an executive order aimed at dismantling the Education Department.
The order acknowledges that the department cannot be shuttered without approval from Congress. Still, Mr. Trump’s education secretary, Linda McMahon, has been focused on what she has called the department’s “final mission.” So far, at least 1,300 workers have been fired, an effective gutting of the agency, while more than 500 accepted the administration’s offer of early retirement. Ms. McMahon has said that there will be additional job cuts.
Ms. McMahon told Fox News in an interview on Tuesday that one of her immediate goals was to “transfer different jobs that are being done at the Department of Education” to other agencies.
Here is what we know about the next phase of the Trump administration’s effort to reshape and reduce the federal government’s role in education.
Key training programs are outsourced to the Labor Department.
Under the changes announced on Tuesday, the Labor Department will assume a larger role in administering adult education, family literacy programs and career and technical education. The Education Department will send $2.6 billion to the Labor Department to cover the cost of the programs.
The two departments initially agreed to the move on May 21, but were blocked the following day by a trial judge who was considering a lawsuit against the president’s efforts to curtail the federal government’s role in the nation’s schools.
Specifically, the lawsuit challenged Mr. Trump’s order to dismantle the agency and the firing of nearly half its staff. On Monday, the Supreme Court intervened and sided with the Trump administration by lifting the temporary order that paused the firings. The lawsuit, along with several other cases involving the Education Department, will continue.
Within an hour of the Supreme Court ruling, workers fired from the Education Department received an email from the department informing them that their official last day would be Aug. 1.
The email said that date did not apply to workers in the Office of Civil Rights, whose employment is the subject of a separate lawsuit.
Critics of the downsizing noted that the structural changes had not occurred in isolation.
The Trump administration has also frozen nearly $7 billion in federal education funding, which helps fund teacher training, after-school programs and other services for public school students nationally.
“Anytime there is a cut in the Department of Education, that is a resource we no longer have,” said Kimberlee Armstrong, the superintendent of Portland Public Schools in Oregon.
The frozen federal dollars would be a loss of more than $3 million for her district, the state’s largest. Portland Public Schools was already facing a deficit of $40 million for the upcoming school year because of a combination of rising costs, declining student enrollment and other factors, Dr. Armstrong said.
Federal loans and programs for special needs would go to other agencies.
The Education Department had also been pursuing an agreement with the Treasury Department to assume control of federal student loans before the lawsuit. Such a move was called for in Project 2025, the right-wing blueprint for overhauling the federal government, in order to consolidate the management of administering loans and disbursements.
An Education Department spokeswoman said the agency was focused on implementing the changes with the Labor Department and that it was unclear when other moves might be announced. Court records show that nine Education Department workers had already been detailed to the Treasury Department.
Ms. McMahon has also previewed additional changes. She has repeatedly suggested, including in an interview with Fox News on Tuesday, that the Department of Health and Human Services could take over programs supporting millions of students with special needs.
She has also stated that the Justice Department could oversee the Education Department’s Office of Civil Rights, which has received more than 5,100 complaints of potential civil rights abuses in schools since March, according to court records.
The Trump administration has used the office to help impose its political agenda, targeting schools that allow transgender students to use the bathrooms or play on the sports teams of their choice as a violation of girls’ rights under Title IX, a law that protects students from sex discrimination.
Critics worry about diluted protections for students.
The government has said that the changes are aimed at improving efficiency, while also making strides toward a long-held conservative goal of limiting the role of the federal government in public schools.
The contract between the Education Department and the Labor Department said that combining work force training programs would “provide a coordinated federal education and work force system,” according to the agreement.
But union leaders, student groups and local educators warned that the changes would dilute protections for students that Congress had mandated.
Marianna Vinson, superintendent of schools in Lemon Grove, Calif., a district that includes about 3,200 students near San Diego, said local educators had struggled to reach federal education officials to prepare for the upcoming school years.
“People don’t answer the phones anymore,” said Ms. Vinson, who served in 2014 as deputy director of the Education Department’s Office of English Acquisition. “And they have just stopped responding to emails.”
Becky Pringle, president of the National Education Association, said the Trump administration’s moves would lead to larger class sizes, cuts to job training and technical education programs and fewer safeguards against civil rights abuses.
“Parents, educators, and community leaders won’t be silent as Trump and his allies take a wrecking ball to public schools and the futures of the 50 million students in rural, suburban and urban communities across America,” Ms. Pringle said. “We will continue to organize, advocate and mobilize until all students have the opportunity to attend the well-resourced public schools where they can thrive.”
Sarah Mervosh contributed reporting.
Michael C. Bender is a Times correspondent in Washington.
The post What’s Next for Trump’s Plans to Dismantle the Education Department appeared first on New York Times.
