Trump & Education Secretary Linda McMahon reportedly plan to shut down US Department of Education

United States President Donald Trump and his newly appointed Secretary of Education Linda McMahon plan to shut down the U.S. Department of Education, fulfilling a campaign promise.

Trump tried to eliminate the agency during his first term from 2016 to 2020 but failed to do so.

Yes, that McMahon

Earlier in March, Linda McMahon was confirmed as Trump's education secretary by a razor-thin margin of a 51 - 45 vote in the U.S. Senate, according to the Guardian.

While cabinet appointees usually enjoy bipartisan support, with Secretary of State Marco Rubio approved by over 90 per cent of U.S. senators; McMahon's narrow confirmation was in light of her main mission.

To dismantle the agency she is taking charge of.

If the name McMahon sounds familiar, it's because she rose to prominence as the wife of Vince McMahon, of the wrestling promotion WWE fame.

Reuters reports that Trump is planning to sign an executive order to shut down McMahon's agency, the Department of Education (DOE), and finally fulfil a 2016 campaign promise.

ABC reports that Trump will direct McMahon to take all necessary steps within the law to dissolve the department.

However, the pathway to closing the DOE is not straightforward, as the DOE is a cabinet-level department.

This means that it will require congressional approval to shut down, and in the Senate, it will require 60 out of 100 Senators to approve it.

The Republican party currently controls 53 seats and will require seven opposition Democrats to join them.

However, as McMahon's confirmation implies, this will be an uphill battle for them.

But why?

Trump, as well as the conservative Republican leaders that support him, have long sought to reduce the power of the DOE or shut it down entirely.

Singaporeans might think of the DOE as equivalent to our own Ministry of Education, which is responsible for almost all aspects of public education in Singapore.

This includes syllabus, teacher training and appointments, funding, and the building and maintaining education infrastructure.

In the U.S., a federal republic, responsibility for education has traditionally been the reserve of individual state governments.

Even now, Reuters reports that 85 per cent of funding for public schools comes from local or state governments.

It might surprise some Singaporeans to learn that the modern DOE is, in fact, younger than Singapore, having only come into being in 1979, created by the late President Jimmy Carter.

The New York Times explains that the DOE's main role has been to disburse national funds to public schools, where previously, states had to rely on their own revenue to pay for education.

It is also responsible for student loans and educational financial aid.

Culture war

But perhaps the most controversial aspect is its role as "a civil rights agency", as described by Obama-era education secretary John B King Jr, which would help students with special needs get the "services they need".

As such, it has been at the heart of a battle over "diversity, equity and inclusion", or DEI.

DEI is seen, depending on one's ideological position, as a tool to combat institutional discrimination within U.S. systems or a form of "racist, anti-America, ahistorical propaganda".

This was how it was described by Project 2025, a conservative playbook for Trump's administration that Trump disavowed during his 2024 campaign, but now appears to be adhering closely to.

It further describes the DOE as a "federal intrusion in a traditionally state and local realm".

Critiques of Project 2025 and the plan to shutter the DOE come from many sources, including the National Education Association, one of the largest teachers' unions in the U.S.

It describes attempts to shut down the DOE as a "power grab" that "starve" public schools of need resources and instead sends them to "discriminatory and unaccountable private school" or for "tax cuts for billionaires who funded his campaign".

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Top image via WWE & Wikipedia