Week in review: Trump seeks to dismantle Dept. of Education; EEOC warns DEI may violate civil rights
1. Trump orders dismantling of the US Department of Education
The White House published an executive order Thursday titled "Improving Education Outcomes by Empowering Parents, States, and Communities."
The directive instructs Secretary of Education Linda McMahon "to the maximum extent appropriate and permitted by law, take all necessary steps to facilitate the closure of the Department of Education and return authority over education to the States and local communities while ensuring the effective and uninterrupted delivery of services, programs, and benefits on which Americans rely."
The Department of Education was created by the Department of Education Organization Act of 1979 and spent over $268 billion in 2024, comprising 4% of federal spending.
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"The experiment of controlling American education through Federal programs and dollars — and the unaccountable bureaucracy those programs and dollars support — has plainly failed our children, our teachers, and our families," the executive order stated. "Closing the Department of Education would provide children and their families the opportunity to escape a system that is failing them. Today, American reading and math scores are near historical lows."
The executive order cited statistics from the National Assessment for Educational Progress showing that 70% of eighth graders were below proficient in reading and 72% were below proficient in math to claim "the Federal education bureaucracy is not working."
The National Assessment of Educational Progress also found that six-in-10 fourth-grade students are not proficient in math.
The U.S. ranks 28th out of the 37 countries in the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development.
The order also insisted that the closure of the department "would drastically improve program implementation in higher education."
"The Department of Education currently manages a student loan debt portfolio of more than $1.6 trillion. This means the Federal student aid program is roughly the size of one of the Nation's largest banks, Wells Fargo. But although Wells Fargo has more than 200,000 employees, the Department of Education has fewer than 1,500 in its Office of Federal Student Aid. The Department of Education is not a bank, and it must return bank functions to an entity equipped to serve America's students."
A fact sheet published by the White House Thursday claimed that since 1979, the department has spent over $3 trillion "with virtually nothing to show for it."
"Despite per-pupil spending having increased by more than 245% over that period, there has been virtually no measurable improvement in student achievement," the fact sheet states.
Ryan Foley is a reporter for The Christian Post. He can be reached at: ryan.foley@christianpost.com
