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Federal Shorts: U.S. Dept of Education loses in Court and at Senate Hearings

Updated: Jun 9

Blue banner with pencil icon, text: "Federal Shorts, 4PE Makes Sense out of Chaos," and "4PE News" in a circle. Calm and informative tone.

Trump Loses in Court but Continues to Gut Dept of Ed

Trump’s 2026 budget request for the U.S. Department of Education (ED) continued his goals to deeply cut and eventually eliminate the ED. This is even after a federal judge ruled against Trump’s attempt to dismantle the Department of Education and ordered the Department to rehire fired staff. These actions needed Congressional approval, which Trump does not have. Nevertheless, many essential programs in the Department are unfunded or severely underfunded in the budget request. Meanwhile, even though charter schools are notorious for fraud, waste and benefiting the wealthy at the expense of those with low incomes, Trump has requested an additional $60 million for a Charter Schools Program.

McMahon Cannot Answer Basic History and Policy Questions

4 Public Education identified early on that Trump’s Secretary of Education, Linda McMahon, had no idea what she was doing when she couldn’t even define one of the most critical education laws, the Individual With Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), which ensures that students with disabilities are educated in the least restrictive environment in public schools.

However, she trumped that display of inadequacy today, June 4, 2025, when she refused to answer the most basic questions about U.S. history from U.S. senators. Senators asked clarifying questions about DEI after Secretary McMahon’s confusing anti-DEI directives which threatened withholding of federal funds without clear definitions of what was considered to be “DEI” and what was not. ALthough judges blocked McMahon’s attempts to ban DEI in schools, many questions were left unanswered.

Today, Senator Lee pressured McMahon to clarify what is considered “illegal DEI.” She asked McMahon specifically whether lessons on Tulsa race massacre would be considered “illegal DEI.” Repeatedly, McMahon said would have to “get back to you on it” to Lee, making it very clear that McMahon did not know policy or American history.

Hear more of Senator Lee’s line of questioning here. McMahon left questions unanswered, including whether social studies standards could teach that Biden won the 2020 election.

Senator Lee (D-PA) and Dept of Ed Secretary McMahon at Senate hearing. Text reads ‘I don’t understand why you are incapable of answering.’ Forbes.

McMahon Gets a Failing Grade at Senate Budget Hearing

Pencil on a marked test sheet with a large red "F". Text reads "Secretary McMahon Fails Her Test this Week."

Trump’s Secretary of Education, Linda McMahon, struggled and failed at this week’s June 2, 2025 Senate Appropriation hearings on budget cuts at ED. A lack of transparency and accountability in her answers and actions should be concerning to all education activists and parents. 4 Public Education will provide highlights below, but one can watch the hearings here.

Office of Civil Rights (OCR): Senators voiced concern about the enforcement of civil rights in schools after ED lost more than half its staff through early retirement buyouts and other staff reductions (a.k.a., layoffs). Senators were rightfully suspicious when McMahon claimed that her staff had become more “efficient” enabling them to reduce the OCR backlog of cases by nearly 90% in a few short months despite laying off half of OCR. Everyone should be leery of McMahon's vague claims that she has “an efficient staff that has changed programs” which enabled them to deal with the backlog. “Changed programs” sounds like it could involve violating civil rights of students and other laws.

Low Income Student College Grant Program Cuts: Besides failing students by permitting cuts of $1.5 billion per year to grant programs (TRIO and GEAR UP) that assist low income students to enter and graduate from college, she also failed basic math when she agreed that 10 year cuts to those programs would save over a trillion dollars when 10 years times $1.5 billion is only $15 billion. The cuts to these programs will have devastating effects on students. Senator Susan Collins of Maine shared that she had “seen the lives of countless first-generation and low-income students, not only in Maine, but across the country… changed by the TRIO program.”

Literacy Program Cuts: Senators grilled McMahon on cuts to literacy programs, despite her claims that the proposed budget would improve literacy performance with a $4.5 billion cut to K-12 education. Sen. Jack Reed, D-R.I., questioned how the Education Department plans to make literacy a priority with a 15% cut in funding? McMahon did not have a satisfactory response, except to say, “we’ll spend it more responsibly.”

Mental Health Grant Cuts: McMahon’s budget included cutting about $1 billion in multi-year school-based mental health grants previously awarded. Sen. Chris Murphy commented, “It’s extraordinary because you didn’t cut off new grants. You cut off existing grants…. So in states all across the nation, blue and red, there are now mental health programs for kids that are shutting down.” McMahon’s response claimed that the grants weren’t cancelled, but that the recipients will need to submit new applications. (Sounds like another way of saying the grants were cancelled, right?)