The Trump administration’s decimation of the Department of Education is back underway. After U.S. District Judge Myong Joun halted Trump’s plan to dismantle the department by reinstating the 1,400 staff members who were fired en masse, the Supreme Court has now paused that ruling, allowing Linda McMahon to resume the administration’s earlier plan.
Although Trump explicitly ran on a campaign promise to decimate the Education Department, his legal defense claims that this is not what inspired the mass firings. According to CNN, the Trump administration has termed these firings simply “internal management decisions.”
The defendants in the case have been careful not to reveal their true intentions of dismantling the department, as such an action would require an authorizing statute from Congress, which Trump does not currently have. If this were to go to Congress, it would likely attract major public attention and discussion, and considering how his problematic mega bill affected his approval ratings despite eventually passing, Trump will likely try everything possible to avoid following the correct legal path.
When the Education Department was first formed during the Carter administration, the goal was to manage federal aid for college students and to uphold civil rights laws — both issues Trump has largely dismissed throughout his political career. It’s no surprise, then, that he now aims to “cripple” the agency, according to Judge Joun’s words. This effort mirrors Trump’s decision to gut FEMA.
Just two hours after the Supreme Court’s ruling pausing the block on Trump’s plan to fire employees, Education Department staff received notices informing them that their services were no longer needed. Trump then took to Truth Social to praise the court for its controversial decision, declaring in all caps that now some vital functions of the education department WILL GO BACK TO THE STATES.”
Justice Sonia Sotomayor, however, released a sharply critical statement condemning the court’s “indefensible” decision. She stated that the ruling “will unleash untold harm, delaying or denying educational opportunities and leaving students to suffer from discrimination, sexual assault, and other civil rights violations without the federal resources Congress intended.”
Trump made no secret during his campaign that the goal was always to dismantle the Education Department, and considering he holds a majority in the House, the executive, and the Supreme Court, the separation of powers is under threat. While he has this leeway, he has continued to erode the fabric of democracy, all in pursuit of lowering taxes for the wealthy while slashing the nation’s essential budgetary allocations.
In his second term, Trump has shown he views funding for education and research as a political whip to use against governors who refuse to do his bidding and who push back against his relentless culture wars. Yet, as the slow dismantling of the Education Department continues, unless it can be delayed until the primaries with a potential swing in Congress or the Senate, it increasingly appears that Trump will succeed in crippling the department. The Trump administration has already successfully dismantled the US AID regardless of the legality of the move.
