Trump is Dismantling the Department of Education by a Thousand Cuts
- Marianne Burke, PhD
- 10 minutes ago
- 3 min read
Trump Blocks U.S. Department of Education Funding Authorized by Congress
Federal education programs are caught in the middle of a legal fight over the Trump administration’s role in federal spending. As of July 27, 2026, the White House is blocking $2 billion in education funding from 35 programs under the U.S. Department of Education (US ED) and little to no funding has been appropriated to 21 of those programs. This comes after Congress rejected the administration’s proposed cuts of over 15% to the 2026 US ED budget. Now the Trump administration is using another tactic to dismantle the agency: refusing to ‘appropriate’ the money Congress approved for the US ED.
Each year the funding process for the following fiscal year (FY) starts with the President proposing a budget, Congress revising and approving the budget, and the President signing the budget that was approved by Congress. Afterwards, the federal Office of Management (OMB) must ‘apportion’ or dispense the approved funds to each agency before an agency can fund their programs. In previous administrations, funds were quickly dispensed to the agencies. In contrast, this year, the administration claims education funds will not be given “on autopilot” as the OMB claims to be reviewing each program before dispensing funds. Meanwhile, appropriations for 35 programs are being withheld by the OMB, and funding for 20 programs are due to expire in 2 months, on September 30, 2026. Thus, it is obvious what the administration is doing to the programs it wants to eliminate.
It has been a longstanding goal of the GOP to abolish the US ED, and the current director of OMB, Russ Vought, is in a powerful position to realize that goal. Elimination of the entire US ED was one of the objectives outlined in Project 2025, the far right plan to reshape the federal government and Vought was an architect of that document, which in part reads:
Schools should be responsive to parents, rather than to leftist advocates intent on indoctrination—and the more the federal government is involved in education, the less responsive to parents the public schools will be. [The US ED] is an example of federal intrusion into a traditionally state and local realm. For the sake of American children, Congress should shutter it and return control of education to the states. -Project 2025
Chapter 11 of Project 2025 covers US ED. The chapter starts with “Federal education policy should be limited and, ultimately, the federal Department of Education should be eliminated,” as authored by Lindsey M. Burke (Heritage Foundation and Deputy Chief of Staff for Policy and Programs, U.S. Department of Education).
The Trump administration is working toward that end of eliminating the US ED by cutting funding to education programs and by transferring responsibility of other ED programs to other agencies, as 4 Public Education shares in the blog below.
Meanwhile, lawmakers are already working on the FY2027 budget. Again, the President’s proposed FY27 budget cuts funding to many programs. For the 2027-2028 school year he proposed eliminating funding for Titles IIA (professional development), III (English Learner Services), IVA (Academic Enrichment/Student Support), IVB (Before and After School Programs), the Rural Education Achievement Program (REAP), McKinney-Vento (Homeless Student Services), and Adult Education. He proposed drastic cuts to Innovation and Improvement Grants, and the Institute of Education Sciences (IES). His FY27 budget proposal indicates his ongoing attempt to abolish the ED through defunding and dismemberment.
OMB Apportionment of Congressional Funding for ED Programs
As of August 3, 2026, OMB has not apportioned the full 2026 funding Congress appropriated for these 35 ED programs. Funding for 20 programs will expire if not spent by September 30, 2026.
Comments