Funding conditions may limit additional Education Department changes
Democrats in Congress are preparing to use their new majorities after the midterms to challenge some of President Donald Trump’s marquee education policies, starting with the administration’s plan to close the U.S. Education Department and move some of its functions to other agencies. Rep. Bobby Scott of Virginia, the top Democrat on the House Committee on Education and the Workforce, is preparing committee investigations, while some Democrats on the Senate Appropriations Committee are planning to add conditions on federal spending bills. Trump has threatened to use his veto power, which is likely to limit what Congress can enact.
Scott said he plans to “leave no rock unturned” as he takes the helm of the panel’s investigative powers, which include authority to issue subpoenas and hold hearings. The committee is preparing to explore the administration’s efforts to close the department and transfer its functions to other agencies, its oversight of federal student loans and its anti-discrimination policies, Scott said. Under Trump, the Education Department has prioritized investigations into transgender issues while reducing its attention to systemic racism in schools.
A day after the midterm elections, Scott sent a letter to 10 federal agencies reminding them to preserve records that might become part of a congressional review. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, a Massachusetts Democrat, called on Democrats to “hold the Trump administration accountable for dismantling the Department of Education and turning its back on students.”
Democrats are preparing to use their oversight and appropriations powers to push back against administration decisions that have reverberated through schools and universities. Some Democrats on the Senate Appropriations Committee are planning to add conditions on spending bills aimed at reining in the Trump administration’s education agenda, as the committee explores harder checks through the budgeting process. “I think there will be an interest in using the power of the purse to establish guard rails and prevent these abusive practices,” Sen. Chris Van Hollen, a Maryland Democrat on the Appropriations Committee, said.
Last year, Democrats failed to secure broad language in a funding bill to block further dismantling of the Education Department. With majorities in both chambers, they are preparing to try again. Van Hollen described appropriations as one avenue to “stop the bleeding,” but not necessarily a way to reverse the changes already made. “It’s a little harder to try to rebuild an entity just through an appropriations bill,” he said. “But we can certainly try to prevent further damage and then seek to reverse the harm that’s been done.”
There is also interest in conditioning federal funding to rein in Trump’s efforts to reshape higher education, including the White House’s repeated efforts to cut funding at Harvard and other prestigious universities. “That said,” Van Hollen added, “we’re dealing with an administration that has demonstrated no respect for the law.”
The White House has given no sign of backing away from its campaigns to close the department and to end diversity, equity and inclusion policies. During Trump’s second term, administration officials cut the Education Department’s staff by nearly half and signed intergovernmental agreements parceling its top duties to other agencies. In higher education, the administration has sought to end DEI practices and limit international enrollment, using federal funding as leverage to advance policies favored by the White House.
Trump officials have denounced the Democrats’ plans. Education Department spokesperson Savannah Newhouse said they were plotting to “prematurely sabotage” Education Secretary Linda McMahon. White House spokesperson Liz Huston accused Democrats of failing American students with “disastrous leadership” before Trump returned to office.
Education advocates are pushing Democrats to go a step further. Some hope to see appropriations language ordering the administration to reverse decisions moving Education Department functions to other agencies, including one that put special education programs under the Department of Health and Human Services and another that put the investigation of school discrimination claims under the Justice Department. “I think it’s going to become more and more apparent that they don’t have the authority just to keep dismantling some of these offices,” said Aaron Ament, president of the advocacy group Student Defense, which is representing plaintiffs in a lawsuit challenging the administration’s plans to close the department and transfer its functions.
Some advocates are hoping the next Congress will be in place in time to approve a nomination of a replacement for Harmeet Dhillon, an assistant attorney general who spearheaded the Justice Department’s sweeping investigations into elite universities. Dhillon announced her resignation last Thursday in the wake of the midterms. Some education advocates were also alarmed by Trump’s promotion of Stephen Miller to chief of staff; Associated Press reporting described Miller as the architect of some of Trump’s most hard-line policies.
Todd Wolfson, president of the American Association of University Professors, said the higher-education environment was tough enough that the organization endorsed candidates for the first time during the midterms. Those candidates included Abdul El-Sayed, a former professor, who won the race for Michigan’s open Senate seat. Wolfson is now looking not only at reversing some of what has happened during the Trump administration but at building a campaign for a free public higher education system. “Most other countries have figured this out, and we can too,” he said. With Trump’s veto power intact, such a change is unlikely in the next two years.
Congressional investigations can apply political pressure and uncover how decisions were made, but they are unlikely to present a substantial brake on the education policies Democrats have opposed over the last two years. With Trump pledging to veto Democratic bills he sees as harmful, there is little optimism for legislative countermeasures.
The Associated Press reported that education issues receded to the background in the midterm elections, which became a referendum on Trump’s economic policies and the Iran war, and that education is expected to fall farther down the list of priorities as Democrats sort out a vast oversight agenda, behind big topics like the president’s financial interests and federal immigration raids.
Despite their new power, there is little optimism that Democrats can override Trump’s veto on major education bills, though some advocates want lawmakers to try anyway. “Even if he vetoes them, let’s put the pressure on to get it to his desk, and then you see what the contrast is,” said Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers union.
Some on the right are pushing for last-minute legislation to advance Trump’s agenda. A day after the midterms, the Heritage Foundation asked Republican lawmakers to propose a bill to close the Education Department and strip any mention of it from federal law. In what The Associated Press characterized as a political Hail Mary, the group argued that the agency has failed to prove its value since it opened in 1980. The letter asked Republicans to work with McMahon “to sunset this failed bureaucracy.”
Democrats are trying to build pressure through hearings, subpoenas, record preservation and spending conditions, while the White House has given no sign of backing away from its campaigns to close the department and end diversity, equity and inclusion policies, and the Heritage Foundation presses Republicans to complete the effort legislatively. With presidential veto power intact and education expected to fall farther down the new majority’s list of priorities, the immediate effect of the Democratic gains is more scrutiny and funding leverage, not a guaranteed reversal of the administration’s changes.
AP’s Hollingsworth reported from Mission, Kansas. The Associated Press said its education coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations and that it is solely responsible for the content.