Reports variously celebrating or mourning the alleged death of the U.S. Department of Education at the hands of President Donald Trump are circulating widely. But as with early reports of Mark Twain’s alleged demise, the news may be slightly exaggerated.
Although the administration appears to be moving in that direction, truly getting the federal government out of education is a long way away. It will require significant cooperation from Congress, too. And the Deep State swamp is already fighting back hard behind the scenes.
Various news reports in recent days have said Trump is preparing an executive order to shut down all functions of the department not explicitly enshrined in federal law. However, because so much of what it does is based in statute, the process will involve sending many functions to other departments.
It is indeed true that the unconstitutional department appears to be in the process of being shuttered, albeit slowly. Just this week, it was announced that about half of its staff was being cut. All employees, meanwhile, were told not to come back to the office until further notice.
In addition, at least a billion dollars’ worth of contracts or grants identified by the Elon Musk-led Department of Government Efficiency have been cancelled so far. Many involved “Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion,” gender-bending extremism, and other indoctrination programs that have become a lightning rod for criticism.
Despite no constitutional authority to be involved in education, many of the education department’s key functions are set to be transferred to other federal departments and cabinets. The agencies that will take over various aspects of education policy for now include the departments of Health and Human Services, Labor, Justice, State, and Interior.
There are several bills in Congress that would deal with the issue in a variety of ways. As The Newman Report documented late last year, key legislation introduced in the U.S. Senate that has received significant attention would preserve much of the U.S. government’s role in education policy.
But U.S. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon does appear ready to work herself out of a job, as President Trump requested, if possible. Indeed, shortly after being confirmed, she sent a powerful letter to staff giving them what she called “Our Department’s Final Mission.”
Since the department was created in 1980, it has burned through over $1 trillion, explained McMahon. And yet, “student outcomes have consistently languished,” she said charitably, alluding to the fact that less than a third of U.S. students today are even “proficient” in core subjects such as reading and math.
Meanwhile, millions of young Americans are “trapped in failing schools, subjected to radical anti-American ideology, or saddled with college debt for a degree that has not provided a meaningful return on their investment,” added McMahon, echoing Trump’s concerns.
“The reality of our education system is stark, and the American people have elected President Trump to make significant changes in Washington,” she warned the bureaucracy. “Our job is to respect the will of the American people and the President they elected, who has tasked us with accomplishing the elimination of bureaucratic bloat here at the Department of Education — a momentous final mission — quickly and responsibly.”
McMahon said she shares Trump’s vision of sending control over education back to states and empowering parents, which is sometimes code for giving them taxpayer money. And now, she said, the department has the opportunity to “perform one final, unforgettable public service to future generations of students.”
While she never specifically says the bureaucracy will truly be shut down, it was implied. “I hope you will join me in ensuring that when our final mission is complete; we will be able to say that we left American education freer, stronger, and with more hope for the future,” McMahon concluded hopefully.
In various public statements, McMahon has said Trump plans to shut down the department “sooner rather than later.” The president and the administration do understand, however, that congressional support will be required to take such drastic action. And with quite a few squishy RINOs (Republicans in Name Only) making up the GOP’s thin majority, that is by no means guaranteed.
There are numerous key statutes that must be repealed to truly get D.C. out of the nation’s classrooms. These include the “Every Student Succeeds Act” (ESSA), the “Elementary and Secondary Education Act” (ESEA), the “Individuals with Disabilities Education Act” (IDEA), the “Higher Education Act,” and the “Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act.”
Some of the ideas about how to proceed on this appear to be taken from Project 2025, which proposed a “Department of Education Reorganization Act” to transfer federal education responsibilities to other agencies. And indeed, bills introduced in both houses of Congress would do precisely this.
Another key element being considered by the administration involves “school choice.” Proposals range from tax-funded vouchers (or Education Scholarship Accounts, also known as ESAs), to federal tax credits. Some would be funded by taxes, while others would merely divert taxes from the federal government into scholarship-granting non-profits.
But education researcher and educator John Klyczek, author of School World Order: The Technocratic Globalization of Corporatized Education, argued in an interview with this writer that what the Swamp really seeks is the corporatization and standardization of all education. This includes bringing private schools and homeschooling under control under the guise of “choice.”
Some of the agenda, he says, was outlined in Project 2025. “Far from abolishing government control of schools, the Project 2025 plan to disband the ED would only restructure the bureaucracies involved in administering federal education entitlements,” he explained in an investigative piece for UnlimitedHangout.com.
“In these ways, Project 2025’s ‘Department of Education Reorganization Act’ would actually expand, rather than diminish, government reaches into education as five different federal agencies, rather than a single department, would be permitted authority over school systems,” continued Klyczek, who worked closely with former Reagen education advisor Charlotte Iserbyt.
Klyczek, who teaches at the college level, continued:
In sum, the Project 2025 plan to dismantle the ED is just another contrivance to refurbish the labyrinth of federal bureaucracies which has always systematically reduced school learning outcomes to an aggregate of mental health and workforce competencies that determine student placement in the “human capital” supply chain of America’s planned economy. By scattering federal education entitlements to HHS and the DOL, data-tracking of students’ mental health and career pathways outcomes would be streamlined by HHS and the DOL respectively, thus magnifying the medicalization and corporatization of government schooling. In this redistributed bureaucracy, HHS and the DOL would also track student health and career outcomes linked with PFS scholarships subsidized by the school choice tax credits proposed in Project 2025.
Another bill to abolish the department has been introduced repeatedly by Congressman Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) The bill, “To terminate the Department of Education” or H.R. 899, is just one sentence long, mandating that the department be terminated by a specific date.
When asked why the bill was needed in an interview with this writer for The New American magazine when he first introduced it over 6 years ago, Massie laughed, asking, “how much time do you have?”
Ultimately, this should be a bill that unites everyone, including leftists who hate Trump and do not want his administration deciding how children should be educated, he said. But this is a strategic issue, too. “The left understands that this is where you win or lose — in the schools and in the teaching of the children,” Massie explained, adding that there is no constitutional authority for the bureaucracy to exist.
U.S. Parents Involved in Education (USPIE, where Dr. Duke Pesta and this writer serve as advisors, has developed a comprehensive blueprint to remove all federal control over education. The group is working with lawmakers on this. And its blueprint has already been shared with policymakers in Washington as the debate about how to proceed picks up.
“It appears Secretary McMahon is working expeditiously to eliminate all jobs and programs not expressly directed by Congress,” said USPIE chief Sheri Few. “We also believe she will work with Congress to layout the plan to eliminate the unconstitutional bureaucracy altogether.”
“Closing the U.S. Department of Education will take some time,” continued Few. “It needs to happen step-by-step and strategically so that the next Democrat who comes into office won’t just reverse everything with another executive order.”
“We must pull it out by its roots,” she added. “We must insist the federal government stay in its constitutional lane, and let states be in the driver’s seat. That’s what we need to be reminded of as we are looking at how to close the U.S. Department of Education. Beyond that, we need to end ALL federal education mandates because we know mandates come from other federal agencies as well.”
Shutting down the U.S. Department of Education is a necessary and worthwhile endeavor. Not only has it not helped improve education, but this unconstitutional and lawless bureaucracy has poured jet fuel on the dumpster fire that is the “public school” system. However, conservatives must remain involved and vigilant, because the Swamp never rests—and it will never allow its precious federal control to be removed without a fight.
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