House Republicans Advance Legislation to Formally Dismantle ED

House Republicans have now formally backed President Donald Trump in fulfilling his campaign promise to dismantle the Department of Education, voting Wednesday to advance 10 bills that would codify the White House’s efforts to disperse numerous education programs and offices to other federal agencies.

If passed, the legislation would make 10 of the Trump administration’s 14 interagency agreements permanent. Education Secretary Linda McMahon has described those agreements as a “proof of concept” that the government can function without an Education Department, and while they don’t fully transfer the decision-making power of ED to other agencies, they do shift a lot of operational responsibilities. The bills would go further, transferring all of the education secretary’s responsibilities to other agencies, including setting final grant competition policies and regulations.

All but one bill in the package passed with unanimous support from the GOP majority, who said they backed Trump’s plan because it would prevent waste, fraud and abuse in American education. The one bill that did not receive unanimous support would send the Office of Elementary and Secondary Education to the Department of Labor; Rep. Kevin Kiley from California—who recently changed his party affiliation from Republican to Independent but remains a part of the GOP caucus—was the sole lawmaker who voted against party lines.

Throughout the more than six-hour meeting, Democrats voiced strong opposition, arguing the legislation is counterproductive and would create more bureaucracy, not less. Collectively, the Democrats introduced 31 amendments—none of which were approved.

“Whatever you say about the problems with the Department of Education, these bills will only make things worse,” Rep. Bobby Scott, a Virginia Democrat and ranking member of the committee, said Wednesday in his opening remarks. “These proposals will actually contribute to the creation of miles of bureaucratic red tape … and a significant waste of the taxpayers’ money.”

Republicans countered that moving the grant programs, oversight operations and other responsibilities to other agencies would refocus American education on the promotion of positive student outcomes rather than liberal ideologies.

“Nearly 50 years ago, the Department of Education was created as a payoff for teachers’ union support of Jimmy Carter’s presidential campaign. Its creation was a politically motivated mistake, and today we begin the process of correcting that mistake,” said Rep. Tim Walberg, the Michigan Republican who chairs the committee.

Still, the legislative package has a long way to go before it becomes law. First, it must pass the House, then the Senate. And not all Republicans in the upper chamber support dismantling the department.

Last month, Sen. Bill Cassidy, a Louisiana Republican and chair of the Senate education committee, said he opposed the Trump administration’s plans to move the Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services to the Department of Health and Human Services, USA Today reported. He suggested that it should be moved to the Department of Labor instead and promised fellow committee member Sen. Tim Kaine, a Virginia Democrat, to hold a vote on a bill to block the proposed move. As chair of the committee, Cassidy decides which bills receive a vote, and in most cases a bill must first pass through committee before it reaches the chamber floor.

Cassidy may be more willing to push back against the Trump administration, as his term ends in January. His bid for re-election failed during the Republican primary, largely in part because President Trump didn’t endorse him. But it’s unclear whether his opposition could hinder the House’s package of bills, which doesn’t include special ed.

In addition to stressing that dismantling the department would be costly and wasteful, Democrats argued that by introducing these bills the Republicans were acknowledging the “illegal” nature of Trump’s existing interagency agreements.

“The 10 bills that are under consideration today demonstrate that Republicans in Congress know that the Department of Education lacks the authority to transfer offices and programs to other federal agencies without congressional action,” said Rep. Suzanne Bonamici, an Oregon Democrat. “If the department had this authority, why would we be in this markup? Why would Congress make sure that it’s codifying these interagency agreements?”

Of the 10 bills, two that got the most attention addressed moving the Office of Federal Student Aid to the Department of Treasury and the Office of Elementary and Secondary Education to the Department of Labor. Each received eight proposed amendments, all of which came from Democrats.

Federal Student Aid oversees a key source of funding for colleges and universities, so a significant change for that office could be consequential for higher ed.

While the Trump administration’s interagency agreement concerning student aid outlines a three-part plan to ultimately move all FSA operations to Treasury, the only function transferred so far is the collection of defaulted loans. But if the legislation were to pass, Treasury would manage the entire $1.7 trillion loan portfolio and oversee the disbursement of Pell awards and the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program.

Rep. John Mannion, a New York Democrat, said this would be “one of the more reckless components of the attempts to dismantle the Department of Education.”

Democrats also spoke out against the bills that would transfer the Offices of Postsecondary Education and Career and Technical Education to the Department of Labor, as well as one that would move all oversight of campus childcare programs to HHS, to name a few. Amendments introduced throughout the day largely attempted to delay the transfers and to document existing inefficiencies under the interagency agreements. They included but were not limited to:

• Requesting investigations into whether the Education Department is fulfilling its statutory duties, the results of which must be published before authorities are transferred to other agencies
• Directing the Education Department to rehire staff who were laid off last year prior to moving oversight of their offices
• Mandating that the Trump administration repeal certain regulations before dispersing programs to other agencies

“I heard someone say recently that in this country we are creating a Department of War and shutting down a Department of Education,” Bonamici said. “I just want to encourage people to think about what that says about the country. What does it say to students who are struggling?”

But throughout the meeting, Republicans stood firm, arguing that Democrats were protecting a flawed status quo and that change is needed to improve the country’s education system. While dismantling the department has been a priority for the Trump administration since the beginning of his second term, Walberg told Inside Higher Ed that now is the time to make the changes permanent.

“It was helpful to see the administration’s IAAs play out in practice. We know interagency coordination is possible, so it wasn’t a question of whether agencies could coordinate—it was how to structure that coordination most effectively,” he said.