IHEP Challenges McMahon’s Cuts to IES

The Institute for Higher Education Policy, in partnership with the Association for Education Finance and Policy, is suing Education Secretary Linda McMahon for the cuts she has made to both the department’s staff and its external contracts.

The complaint, filed Friday, is one of a growing number of higher ed–related legal challenges that have been brought against the Trump administration since President Donald Trump took office in January. 

This time IHEP is suing over the cuts to the Institute of Education Sciences, which lost about 80 percent of its 120 employees as part of the mass layoffs in March. A month prior, Elon Musk and the Department of Government Efficiency terminated nearly $900 million worth of the agency’s contracts, including several for congressionally mandated surveys and reports.

Represented by Public Citizen Litigation Group, the plaintiffs argue that the Trump administration has exceeded its authority, violating constitutional separations of power and interfering with the agency’s statutory responsibility to collect and disseminate data.