Angélica Infante-Green, Rhode Island’s commissioner of elementary and secondary education, speaks at a forum on Tuesday, May 6, 2025, at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C. (Screenshot via YouTube)

WASHINGTON — U.S. Senate Democrats on Tuesday blasted the Trump administration’s efforts to dismantle the U.S. Department of Education, underscoring the impact of the dizzying array of cuts, overhauls and proposed changes to the agency on students, families and educators.

Sen. Patty Murray, who hosted the forum in a U.S. Senate hearing room alongside several Democratic colleagues, said Trump is “essentially bulldozing the Department of Education, regardless of who depends on it, regardless of who is still inside, and regardless of the very loud outcry from parents and educators and students about this.”

The Washington state Democrat brought in education advocates and leaders, who emphasized the importance of the department in delivering on federal resources for public education, investigating civil rights complaints and helping students cheated by predatory institutions.

Trump and his administration have sought to dramatically reshape the federal role in education, including an executive order calling on Education Secretary Linda McMahon to facilitate the closure of her own department, the gutting of more than 1,300 employees at the agency, threats to revoke funds for schools that use diversity, equity and inclusion practices and a crackdown on “woke” higher education.

‘Unnecessary confusion and chaos’

Angélica Infante-Green, Rhode Island’s commissioner of elementary and secondary education, said she and colleagues who lead state education across the country have spent a great deal of time trying to decipher the intent of Trump’s executive orders and the department’s directives and policy changes.

“They seem unclear and cause unnecessary confusion and chaos for all of us,” Infante-Green said. “While the impact of the confusion may be hard to quantify,  what is clear is that students and families and educators are the losers in this new paradigm.”

Denise Forte, CEO of the nonprofit policy and advocacy group EdTrust, said “most urgently, we are alarmed by the mass firing of over half of the department staff.”

“This isn’t reform — it is sabotage,” Forte said, pointing to the layoffs hitting wide swaths of the department, particularly in the Office for Civil Rights, Office of Federal Student Aid and Institute of Education Sciences.

“With the Office for Civil Rights now severely understaffed, civil rights complaints will skyrocket while response capacity plummets,” she said.

Students with disabilities 

The cuts at the agency and Trump’s proposal in March that the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services “will be handling special needs” have sparked worries among disability advocates over whether the department can carry out its responsibilities to serve students with disabilities.

Diane Willcutts, director of Education Advocacy, said she’s been getting “panicked phone calls from parents of children with disabilities who are wondering, ‘What does this all mean?’”

Willcutts has worked for over two decades in Connecticut and Massachusetts helping families of children with disabilities navigate the education process.

“I think everyone’s shell-shocked, and we’re looking for direction — how can we be helpful to you in order to protect the U.S. Department of Education?” she said. “I know there’s this assumption that ‘Oh, the states will take care of it.’ That is absolutely not the case, I can tell you in my state that is not what is happening right now, and so, as I said, there’s a level of panic but we’re looking for direction.”

Trump’s budget request

Meanwhile, Trump also released a budget request last week that calls for $12 billion in spending cuts at the department.

Wisconsin Democratic Sen. Tammy Baldwin said the budget includes “devastating cuts to many critical programs,” and that the proposal “comes at a time when too many students are chronically absent and achieving at levels that will not set them up for success.”

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said the Trump administration is “cutting so many things — don’t feel alone, Department of Education.”

“They don’t know what they’re doing about just about anything, and they want to cut everything, but to cut education, which has been sacrosanct in America, is just awful,” the New York Democrat said.

Schumer said Tuesday’s “spotlight hearing” is just one in a series Senate Democrats will be hosting in response to Trump’s cuts to the department.

Trump administration officials said the outrage was misplaced. 

“If Senate Democrats were truly interested in fighting for parents, students, and teachers as they claim, where was their outrage over this year’s dismal math and reading scores? Don’t get it twisted,” Savannah Newhouse, a spokesperson for the U.S. Department of Education, said in a statement shared with States Newsroom.

Senate Democrats “are fighting President Trump’s education agenda for one reason: to protect the bloated bureaucracy that has consistently failed our nation’s students,” Newhouse said.

“By returning education authority to the states, President Trump and Secretary McMahon will help every American child — including those in public schools — to have the best shot at a quality education.” 

President Donald Trump announces a proposed shift of Education Department programs to the Small Business Administration and the Department of Health and Human Services during a press availability in the Oval Office on March 21, 2025. (Source: White House livestream) 

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump said Friday that the U.S. Small Business Administration would handle the student loan portfolio for the slated-for-elimination Education Department, and that the Department of Health and Human Services would handle special education services and nutrition programs.

The announcement — which raises myriad questions over the logistics to carry out these transfers of authority — came a day after Trump signed a sweeping executive order that directs Education Secretary Linda McMahon to “take all necessary steps to facilitate the closure” of the department to the extent she is permitted to by law.

“I do want to say that I’ve decided that the SBA, the Small Business Administration, headed by Kelly Loeffler — terrific person — will handle all of the student loan portfolio,” Trump said Friday morning.

The White House did not provide advance notice of the announcement, which Trump made at the opening of an Oval Office appearance with Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth.

The Education Department manages student loans for millions of Americans, with a portfolio of more than $1.6 trillion, according to the White House.

In his executive order, Trump said the federal student aid program is “roughly the size of one of the Nation’s largest banks, Wells Fargo,” adding that “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.”

‘Everything else’ to HHS

Meanwhile, Trump also said that the Department of Health and Human Services “will be handling special needs and all of the nutrition programs and everything else.”

It is unclear what nutrition programs Trump was referencing, as the U.S. Department of Agriculture manages school meal and other major nutrition programs.

One of the Education Department’s core functions includes supporting students with special needs. The department is also tasked with carrying out the federal guarantee of a free public education for children with disabilities Congress approved in the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, or IDEA.

Trump added that the transfers will “work out very well.”

“Those two elements will be taken out of the Department of Education,” he said Friday. “And then all we have to do is get the students to get guidance from the people that love them and cherish them, including their parents, by the way, who will be totally involved in their education, along with the boards and the governors and the states.”

Trump’s Thursday order also directs McMahon to “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.”

SBA, HHS heads welcome extra programs

Asked for clarification on the announcement, a White House spokesperson on Friday referred States Newsroom to comments from White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt and heads of the Small Business Administration and Health and Human Services Department.

Leavitt noted the move was consistent with Trump’s promise to return education policy decisions to states.

“President Trump is doing everything within his executive authority to dismantle the Department of Education and return education back to the states while safeguarding critical functions for students and families such as student loans, special needs programs, and nutrition programs,” Leavitt said. “The President has always said Congress has a role to play in this effort, and we expect them to help the President deliver.”

Loeffler and HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said their agencies were prepared to take on the Education Department programs.

“As the government’s largest guarantor of business loans, the SBA stands ready to deploy its resources and expertise on behalf of America’s taxpayers and students,” Loeffler said.

Kennedy, on the social media platform X, said his department was “fully prepared to take on the responsibility of supporting individuals with special needs and overseeing nutrition programs that were run by @usedgov.”

The Education Department directed States Newsroom to McMahon’s remarks on Fox News on Friday, where she said the department was discussing with other federal agencies where its programs may end up, noting she had a “good conversation” with Loeffler and that the two are “going to work on the strategic plan together.” 

Keri Rodrigues, president of the National Parents Union, speaks at a rally on Friday, March 14, 2025, in Washington, D.C, protesting the U.S. Education Department’s mass layoffs and President Donald Trump’s plans to dismantle the agency. (Photo by Shauneen Miranda/States Newsroom)

WASHINGTON — Dozens gathered Friday outside the U.S. Department of Education to protest the ousting of more than 1,300 employees and President Donald Trump’s plans to dismantle the agency.

As the fate of the 45-year-old department hangs in the balance following the cuts this week, demonstrators held signs at a rally outside of the Education Department headquarters with slogans including “Educate Don’t Eliminate” and “WWE: We Want Education,” a reference to Education Secretary Linda McMahon’s World Wrestling Entertainment background.

“These cuts — this isn’t just about a department and a building — this is about federal streams of money that help students live (up to) their full potential,” said Kim Anderson, executive director of the National Education Association, the country’s largest labor union.

“This agenda is about cutting funding and shipping it to private schools, it is about vouchers, make no mistake about it,” Anderson said. “It is about dismantling public education so that children cannot get what they deserve.”

Trump has repeatedly pledged to shutter the agency, and McMahon confirmed this week that the sweeping cuts marked the first step in that process.

The president alone does not have the authority to close the department, and such an effort would need congressional approval.

‘Fight back’

Following a “honk-a-thon” on Independence Avenue, Sen. Mazie Hirono told the crowd that Trump and billionaire White House adviser Elon Musk “think that they can take a chain saw to government agencies, and they’ve been slashing and burning and firing thousands of people for no cause, and just recently, of course, they got to the Department of Education.”

Trump and Musk have taken significant steps to reduce federal government spending and go after what they see as waste, with the Education Department marking a major target of those efforts.

“But we are all here to fight back because this is no time to be sitting back thinking that other people are going to fight the battles for us,” the Hawaii Democrat said. “No, we are in it together.”

The rally came as department leaders announced this week that they would be cutting a substantial number of the agency’s staff, prompting concerns over how the department could carry out its responsibilities when roughly halving its workforce.

The layoffs make huge cuts to the Office for Civil Rights, Office of Federal Student Aid and Institute of Education Sciences, among other units, according to the nonprofit Education Reform Now, which advocates for more resources for education.

Fulfilling responsibilities

Some of the department’s many responsibilities include administering federal student aid, enforcing civil rights cases, providing Title I funding for low-income school districts and guaranteeing a free public education for children with disabilities via the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, or IDEA.

Through a spokesperson, the department said Thursday its core responsibilities would not be impacted by the cuts.

But protesters Friday worried about the path to dismantling the department.

Molly Cronin, a special education teacher in Virginia, told States Newsroom that “if IDEA is not protected, if Title I is not protected, if Head Start is not funded, our most vulnerable children are going to be failed by the system, and we have a duty as educators to protect all students.”

Cronin, a member of the National Education Association who serves on the board of her local union, said one of the biggest misunderstandings about the agency “is that people think that the federal department is in control of the states and states’ curriculum and programs and all of that, when, in fact, that’s not true.”

Trump has vowed to shut down the department in his quest to move education “back to the states,” despite much of the funding and oversight of schools already occurring at the state and local levels. Legally, the federal government cannot control the curriculum of schools.

Legal challenges to the sweeping cuts are already taking shape, after 21 Democratic attorneys general sued the Trump administration Thursday over the efforts.

Prior to the mass layoffs, the department already witnessed dramatic downsizing in the weeks since Trump took office, with major contract cuts and staff buyouts.

Cuts make mission harder

Antoinette Flores, who worked for the Education Department during the Biden administration, said she knows many of the people harmed by the layoffs. 

“These are colleagues, these are friends, these are dedicated public servants that help students, and it’s devastating to see what’s happening.”

Flores, who focuses on higher education, told States Newsroom the massive cuts are “going to make it much more challenging for students to receive grants and loans that they’re entitled to.”

Rather than go after inefficiencies in the federal government, as Trump and Musk have said is their goal, Flores said a smaller federal workforce would actually “increase fraud, waste and abuse.” 

The Lyndon Baines Johnson Department of Education Building pictured on Nov. 25, 2024. (Photo by Shauneen Miranda/States Newsroom)

WASHINGTON — A group of 21 Democratic attorneys general sued the Trump administration Thursday over the U.S. Education Department’s efforts this week to cut more than 1,300 employees.

The complaint asks the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts to block the department from implementing the “reduction in force,” or RIF, action and President Donald Trump’s “directive to dismantle the Department of Education.”

Attorneys general in Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, the District of Columbia, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New York, New Jersey, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, Washington state and Wisconsin signed onto the suit.

The group said the RIF is “equivalent to incapacitating key, statutorily-mandated functions of the Department, causing immense damage” to their states and educational systems.

Leaders at the 45-year-old agency said Tuesday they would be cutting a substantial number of the agency’s staff, prompting concerns over how the department could carry out its responsibilities when roughly halving its workforce.

The attorneys general argued that the “massive RIF is not supported by any actual reasoning or specific determinations about how to eliminate purported waste in the Department — rather, the RIF is part and parcel of President Trump’s and Secretary (Linda) McMahon’s opposition to the Department of Education’s entire existence.”

Democratic Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes told reporters in Phoenix Thursday morning that the Department of Education cuts would be devastating to Arizona’s public school students, but especially to those who live in rural areas and who have learning disabilities.

“This is part of a deliberate effort to dismantle public education in this country,” Mayes said. “It is going to hurt students, families and schools, especially in rural areas that rely on federal support. And let us be clear, there is absolutely no way that the Department of Education can perform its legal obligations with half the workforce.” 

Madi Biedermann, a spokesperson for the department, said in a written statement to States Newsroom that the agency’s RIF “was implemented carefully and in compliance with all applicable regulations and laws,” and “they are strategic, internal-facing cuts that will not directly impact students and families.”

Some of the department’s core functions include administering federal student aid, enforcing civil rights cases, providing Title I funding for low-income school districts and guaranteeing a free public education for children with disabilities via the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, or IDEA.

Biedermann said the cuts would not impact employees working on the student aid application, student loan servicing and Elementary and Secondary Education Act, or ESEA, Title funds. No workers in the Office of Special Education Programs or the Rehabilitation Services Administration who serve children with disabilities were impacted, she wrote.

She said the department’s Office for Civil Rights “will continue to investigate complaints and vigorously enforce federal civil rights laws.”

But according to an analysis by the nonprofit Education Reform Now, which advocates for more resources for education, based on data from the union representing Education Department workers, the layoffs make huge cuts to the Office for Civil Rights, Office of Federal Student Aid and Institute of Education Sciences, among other units.

Closing the department

Shortly after the announcement of the layoffs, McMahon confirmed to Fox News that the cuts were the first step on the road to shutting down the department.

McMahon said Trump’s “directive to me, clearly, is to shut down the Department of Education” and saw the layoffs as the first step toward eliminating what she sees as “bureaucratic bloat.”

Trump campaigned on a promise to shutter the agency in his quest to move education “back to the states” — despite much of the funding and oversight already occurring at the state and local levels.

The department has also been a major target of Trump and billionaire White House adviser Elon Musk’s efforts to slash federal government spending and eliminate what they see as waste. 

Arizona Mirror reporter Caitlin Sievers contributed to this report.