Trump Moves to Abolish the Dept of Education in Bold Bid to Empower Families and End Federal Overreach

Trump Moves to Abolish the Dept of Education in Bold Bid to Empower Families and End Federal Overreach

By: Fern Sidman

In a sweeping move set to fundamentally reshape the American education landscape, President Trump is forging ahead with a campaign promise to abolish the Department of Education, a move that has already stirred fierce political debate and drawn strong reactions from both supporters and critics. As reported by Fox News on Wednesday, Trump is preparing to sign an executive order that will initiate the disbanding of the federal agency—marking one of the most consequential shifts in U.S. education policy in decades.

According to a White House fact sheet obtained by Fox News, the administration describes the initiative as an effort to “turn over education to families instead of bureaucracies,” underscoring the administration’s long-held view that the federal agency has failed American students while expanding its reach into controversial ideological terrain.

The push to eliminate the Department of Education is grounded in the Trump administration’s broader critique of federal overreach in classrooms, with officials arguing that the agency has done more to push radical ideologies than to improve academic outcomes.

“NAEP (National Assessment of Educational Progress) scores reveal a national crisis — our children are falling behind,” Harrison Fields, White House Principal Deputy Press Secretary, told Fox News. He added that millions of illegal minors admitted under Democratic leadership have strained school systems, reducing resources available to American students.

Fields also cited the rise of Critical Race Theory (CRT) and Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) programs as contributing factors to what he described as “anti-American indoctrination” that harms students, particularly those in underserved communities.

“President Trump’s executive order to expand educational opportunities will empower parents, states, and communities to take control and improve outcomes for all students,” Fields said.

The policy directive comes just days after the Senate confirmed Linda McMahon, former CEO of World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE), to lead the Department of Education. In a memo issued shortly after her confirmation on March 3, McMahon affirmed her commitment to seeing through what she described as a “momentous final mission.”

“The reality of our education system is stark, and the American people have elected President Trump to make significant changes in Washington,” McMahon wrote, according to The Fox News report. “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 — quickly and responsibly.”

Unsurprisingly, the announcement has sent shockwaves through the political establishment, with teachers’ unions and progressive advocacy groups mounting an aggressive opposition campaign. The Fox News report indicated that The American Federation of Teachers (AFT) responded with a strongly worded statement calling on Congress to block the executive order, arguing that such a move would amount to an abdication of federal responsibility.

In a March 5 statement, AFT President Randi Weingarten claimed, “Trying to abolish [the Department of Education] — which, by the way, only Congress can do — sends a message that the president doesn’t care about opportunity for all kids. Maybe he cares about it for his own kids or his friends’ kids or his donors’ kids — but not all kids,” The Fox News report said.

“The Department of Education… is supposed to level the playing field and fill opportunity gaps,” Weingarten added.

The union also pointed to a February NPR/PBS News/Marist poll indicating that more than 60% of Americans “strongly oppose” eliminating the Department of Education, although many observers argue that such polling often fails to reflect growing parental frustration with federal educational mandates and politicized curriculum content.

For Trump and his allies, the push to dismantle the Department of Education is not merely symbolic—it is a statement of governing philosophy, rooted in the belief that education should be locally controlled, parent-driven, and free from ideological imposition by Washington bureaucrats.

Conservatives have long argued that the Department has drifted far from its intended mission, becoming a conduit for progressive orthodoxy and regulatory overreach, rather than a mechanism for educational excellence. Trump’s move signals a dramatic attempt to reverse that trajectory—one that could reframe the national education debate for years to come.

Supporters of the move also emphasize that education policy is constitutionally a state and local matter, and that the federal role should be minimal, focusing only on broad oversight and ensuring civil rights compliance, not dictating curriculum or standards.

Trump’s renewed push to eliminate the Department of Education comes amid grim statistics that reveal deep-seated failures in the American education system. According to Fox News, the White House cited 13 Baltimore high schools in which no students tested proficient in mathematics in 2023—a staggering example of systemic dysfunction despite the billions poured into public education annually.

Meanwhile, the 2024 National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), commonly known as “The Nation’s Report Card”, showed nearly stagnant math scores for eighth graders compared to 2022 and declining reading scores across both fourth and eighth grades. These results underscore what the Trump administration describes as a national education crisis that federal oversight has failed to address.

A key pillar of Trump’s argument, as The Fox News report outlined, is that under Democratic leadership, education resources have been diverted from core academic instruction to serve ideological experiments. A White House fact sheet accompanying the executive order accused the Department of Education of pushing “radical agendas,” including race-based discrimination initiatives and gender identity ideology.

The fact sheet revealed that the Trump administration recently canceled $226 million in grants under the Comprehensive Centers Program, which it said had been used to promote these controversial ideological frameworks at the state and local level.

“Over the past four years, Democrats have allowed millions of illegal minors into the country, straining school resources and diverting focus from American students,” said Harrison Fields, White House Principal Deputy Press Secretary, in an interview with Fox News. “Coupled with the rise of anti-American CRT and DEI indoctrination, this is harming our most vulnerable.”

Trump’s long-held vision is rooted in local control and universal school choice. In public remarks and campaign rallies, he has repeatedly emphasized his goal to empower parents to choose the best educational path for their children—whether public, private, charter, or faith-based.

“The time for universal school choice has come,” Trump declared. “As we return education to the states, I will use every power I have to give parents this right.”

While Trump’s executive order signals his clear intent, the abolition of a federal agency requires congressional approval, per Article II of the U.S. Constitution, as was explained in The Fox News report. The measure would need 60 votes in the Senate, and with Republicans currently holding only 53 seats, the path forward is not guaranteed.

However, Fox News reported there is growing support in Congress for such a move. On January 31, Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY) introduced a bill to terminate the Department of Education by December 2026.

“Unelected bureaucrats in Washington, D.C., should not be in charge of our children’s intellectual and moral development,” Massie said. “States and local communities are best positioned to shape curricula that meet the needs of their students. Schools should be accountable.”

Even Trump, in a moment of candid clarity, acknowledged that his recent nominee to lead the department—Linda McMahon had essentially been tapped to oversee its dismantling, not to revitalize it.

“I want Linda to put herself out of a job,” Trump told reporters on February 4, echoing his belief that education should be governed by the states, not by federal administrators.

In a pointed op-ed published on February 5 in Fox News Digital, Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos likened the current state of education in the United States to a failing grade.

“In report card language, what was a D- is now an F,” DeVos wrote, painting a grim picture of an education system increasingly bogged down by bureaucracy, ideological agendas, and poor performance outcomes. According to DeVos, nothing short of a “complete reset” will restore the nation’s schools to their intended mission: academic excellence focused on student achievement—not political indoctrination.

As highlighted in her Fox News op-ed, DeVos argued that the Department of Education has abandoned its core mission in favor of promoting diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) mandates, which she contends have done little to improve student learning and much to politicize the classroom.

 

“The Department has prioritized the wrong goals, pushing social engineering over math, reading, and critical thinking,” DeVos emphasized. She joined President Trump in calling for the agency’s elimination, asserting that real change will only come when power over education is returned to states, local communities, and parents.

While the Trump administration moves forward with its plan to dismantle the Department, Democrats in Congress have begun raising alarms. As Fox News reported, several Democratic lawmakers sent a formal letter on February 5 to Acting Secretary of Education Denise Carter, demanding clarity about the department’s future and opposing any attempt to shut it down.

“We will not stand by and allow this to happen to the nation’s students, parents, borrowers, educators, and communities,” the lawmakers wrote, as was noted in The Fox News report. They cited the department’s historic role in promoting equal access to quality education and enforcing civil rights protections, regardless of location or socioeconomic background.

Their letter reflected the growing partisan divide over education policy in America. While Democrats view the Department of Education as a vital institution for equity and standardization, critics—including Trump and DeVos—see it as a bloated bureaucracy that obstructs innovation and local autonomy.

Underlying this debate is a sobering reality: student achievement across the country continues to decline, despite massive federal investments in public education. As Fox News has reported in recent weeks, the 2024 National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP)—also known as the Nation’s Report Card—revealed stagnant or declining scores in core subjects like reading and math among fourth- and eighth-grade students.

These results serve as a stark indictment of the status quo, and they have bolstered arguments from Trump administration officials and education reform advocates who insist that top-down governance from Washington has failed American children.

Trump and DeVos are not only calling for dismantling the federal agency—they are proposing an entirely new philosophy of education governance centered on school choice, local control, and parental empowerment.

Although Trump’s executive order may initiate the process of dismantling the Department of Education, Congress must ultimately vote to authorize such a sweeping reform, as required under Article II of the Constitution. With only 53 Republican senators, achieving the necessary 60 votes in the Senate remains a challenge.

Nonetheless, as Fox News has reported, momentum is building. Lawmakers like Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY) have already introduced legislation to abolish the Department by December 2026, signaling growing interest in Congress for a radical rethinking of the federal government’s role in education.

 

The calls for reform—once considered fringe—are now reaching the center of political discourse. DeVos’s stark “F” grade for the current system reflects a broader dissatisfaction felt by parents, students, and taxpayers alike, many of whom view the federal education bureaucracy as more focused on ideological programming than academic success.

The push to eliminate the Department of Education represents a critical moment in the ongoing debate over what kind of education system America wants—and who should be trusted to shape it.

As Trump, DeVos, and their allies see it, the answer lies not in Washington’s bureaucratic corridors, but in the hands of families, local educators, and communities who know their children best.