The Trump administration is exploring dramatic cuts to programs and staff at the U.S. Department of Education, including executive action shuttering department programs that are not protected by law and calling on Congress to close the department entirely.
The executive action could come as early as this week, according to multiple government sources who were not cleared to discuss the administration's plans publicly.
The White House did not respond to a request for comment.
°µºÚ±¬ÁÏ of the Trump administration's plans was first reported by .
This potential executive action comes after the Trump administration, in recent days, placed dozens of Education Department staff on paid administrative leave with little explanation, saying only that the moves were the result of President Trump's federal diversity programs.
Taken together, the news has unsettled department staff and is sure to come up in the Senate confirmation hearing for Trump's nominee to be education secretary, Linda McMahon. That hearing has not yet been scheduled.
The department, with roughly 4,400 employees and an annual budget of $79 billion, has broad responsibility over three major areas: managing approximately $1.6 trillion in federal student loan debt, overseeing implementation and enforcement of the nation's special education law, and administering Title I, the main federal program aimed at improving outcomes for lower-income students.
Can Trump close the Education Department?
While the executive action is expected to outline significant cuts to the Education Department and even call for its closure, the department cannot be closed through executive action alone.
The department was created by an in 1979 and, as such, can only be closed by an act of Congress.
Whether there are enough votes in Congress to close the Education Department is another question entirely. House Republicans have tried before and failed, and Republicans enjoy only narrow majorities in the House and Senate.
What's more, show a majority of Republicans believe the U.S. government should be spending more, not less, on education.
Can Trump make cuts to the education department?
This is a little murkier, but yes, it seems within the discretion of the President and his education secretary to make some cuts to the department – specifically focusing on programs that were not created by Congress – and therefore are not protected by statute.
But much of what the Education Department does – certainly its signature programs – are protected by statute, including the most important federal funding streams to public schools:
- Title I, which is targeted to districts that serve lower-income communities. In 2022, the U.S. Government spent .
- The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, IDEA, which is targeted to help districts serve students with disabilities. In FY 2024, the U.S. Government spent on IDEA.
Both of these funding streams were, like the department itself, created by separate acts of Congress: and . And, as such, cannot be unwound except by Congress. Large changes to either are unlikely, as the programs enjoy broad bipartisan support.
Project 2025, drafted by several Trump loyalists, recommended closing the department and turning both funding streams into no-strings-attached grants, ultimately phasing out the Title I, low-income support dollars within a decade. But, again, that would require an act of Congress – something that seems unlikely.
It's worth noting that, during Trump's first term, Education Secretary Betsy DeVos to the department through the administration's annual budget proposals, including shifting Title I money into a Project 2025-like block grant, but Congress holds the power of the purse and instead passed modest funding increases.
"These are all programs that Congress established and knowingly housed inside the Department of Education," says Dan Zibel, a former top lawyer in the department and now chief counsel at the National Student Legal Defense Network, "and any changes to those programs would not only be short-sighted but require a new vote of Congress."
It may be possible to move one or more of the department's signature responsibilities to a different government agency, which would not close the Education Department but would strip it of much of its power. Still, Zibel says, any large-scale movements, like shifting the office of Federal Student Aid and its massive student loan portfolio to the Treasury Department, as Project 2025 recommended, would certainly require Congress' say-so.
"A lot of what the administration is doing is testing boundaries," says Rick Hess of the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative-leaning think tank, "so we'll see how this works and what might happen in court. I imagine there will be some thinning of the workforce, but it's hard to predict how aggressively they'll move."
Paid administrative leave
While the Trump administration fine-tunes its broader strategy to shrink – or potentially try to close – the Education Department, it has already begun removing staff on a smaller scale.
According to Sheria Smith, president of American Federation of Government Employees Local 252, a union that represents some 2,800 non-management Education Department employees, at least 74 non-management staff have been put on paid administrative leave in recent days.
NPR has spoken with several staff who have been placed on leave, who shared their stories on the condition that we not share their names, for fear they would lose their jobs entirely.
They describe receiving an email, obtained by NPR, informing them that "you will be placed on administrative leave with full pay and benefits pursuant to the President's executive order on DEIA and further guidance from OPM. This administrative leave is not being done for any disciplinary purpose."
None of the staff NPR spoke with say they worked on Diversity Equity Inclusion or Accessibility issues. All of them described being shocked and confused when they received the email.
"It looks very suspicious," says Sheria Smith. "Nothing we've seen gives any rhyme or reason as to why these employees were chosen."
°µºÚ±¬ÁÏ of the staffing changes was first reported by .
One common denominator that connects many of these department staff is a diversity and inclusion-focused workshop, known as Diversity Change Agents, that they attended at some point. The workshop was not only offered by the department, over many years, but, staff say, attendance was encouraged and rewarded by their managers.
What's more, NPR spoke with several staff who say they attended the Diversity Change Agents workshop during President Trump's first administration and were encouraged to do so by Trump's own political appointees.
In response to a request to clarify why these employees have been placed on leave and whether their attendance at a diversity workshop is the reason they have been singled out, Madi Biedermann, Deputy Assistant Secretary for Communications at the department, responded with this statement:
"President Trump was elected to bring about unprecedented reform to the federal civil service to ensure it is merit-based and efficient at serving the interests of the American people. At the Department of Education, we are evaluating staffing in line with the commitment to prioritizing meaningful learning ahead of divisive ideology in schools and putting student outcomes above special interests."
One employee with the department's Office for Civil Rights (OCR) who was placed on leave served on his office's Employee Engagement, Diversity & Inclusion Council (EEDIC), a group created during the first Trump administration.
In an email dated June 5, 2020, obtained by NPR, Trump political appointee Kimberly Richey wrote to several dozen staffers selected to serve on the council, "As we work together to promote diversity, equity, and inclusion in OCR, I want to urge you to keep EEDIC's Mission Statement at the Center of our work … to promote an OCR environment where all employees, whatever their identities, are fully included, engaged, connected, respected, safe, satisfied, and fulfilled as well as a workplace in which barriers to diversity and equal opportunity are removed."
Richey did not respond to a request for comment.
The department staffer, who is also an Army veteran, served on this diversity council but said, through his attorney, that he otherwise had no involvement in DEIA programming.
"There is absolutely no conceivable reason he should ever be placed on administrative leave," says Subodh Chandra, a civil rights attorney based in Cleveland who is representing at least two Education Department staffers who have been placed on paid leave.
Chandra says he believes this execution of Trump's order, rooting out DEIA programs, violates Title Seven of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. "[Federal workers] are protected from either opposing discrimination or participating in any proceeding or activity related to opposing discrimination."
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