President Trump plans to sign an executive order on Thursday instructing Education Secretary Linda McMahon to begin dismantling the agency, according to two White House officials.
The department cannot be closed without the approval of Congress, which created it. But the Trump administration has already taken steps to narrow the agency’s authority and significantly cut its work force while also telegraphing plans to try and shutter it.
The White House officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly about the plans, said the order instructed Ms. McMahon to return authority over education to the states.
USA Today was first to report Mr. Trump’s intent to sign the order on Thursday.
Republican attempts to shutter the agency date back to the 1980s. But the push gained steam in recent years after a parents’ rights movement grew out of a backlash to school policies and shutdowns during the coronavirus pandemic.
That movement, which includes key pro-Trump, grass-roots activists, expanded around opposition to progressive agendas that promoted mandating certain education standards and inclusive policies for L.G.B.T.Q. students. Activists contended that these policies undermined parental rights and values.
But the hyper-partisanship around education issues has been present for decades, from progressive-leaning teachers’ unions who organized against President George W. Bush’s “No Child Left Behind” policies to conservative Republican presidential candidates in 2016 who ran against the Common Core standards elevated by President Barack Obama’s “Race to the Top” program.
Caught in the middle are the nation’s 50 million public school pupils, 15 percent of whom have disabilities. Also watching the debate are undergraduate students who receive Pell Grants because they qualify as low-income (nearly one-third of all college students) and those who receive federal student loans (about 28 percent).
Public schools are mostly funded by taxes collected by states and municipalities that, by definition, already have control over that money. The federal government accounts for about 10 percent of total school funding, but that is distributed by the Education Department largely according to federal law — not the discretion of the president.
That balance of power in Washington explains, at least in part, why no modern president has ever tried to unilaterally shut down a federal department. The Education Department was created by an act of Congress in 1979, and federal lawmakers would have to approve of eliminating it.
Shuttering the Education Department is broadly unpopular, public opinion surveys show. Multiple polls in the past month have shown that roughly two-thirds of Americans oppose the idea.
Mr. Trump’s order is expected to spark another legal fight for the administration, which is already embroiled in multiple lawsuits.
No modern president has ever tried to unilaterally shut down a federal department. Other agencies, such as the Interstate Commerce Commission and the Civil Aeronautics Board, were phased out under Presidents Bill Clinton and Ronald Reagan, but with the support of Congress through legislation.
Additionally, no cabinet-level department has been abolished outright since the U.S. Postal Service replaced the Post Office Department more than half a century ago, and many of the programs the Education Department administers provide a lifeline to schools and students that most lawmakers have been hesitant to jeopardize in the past.
Still, Republican lawmakers have already shown unusual deference to Mr. Trump, even as he has taken steps to challenge Congress’s authority in several areas while flexing his own. Notably, he directed agencies not to spend funds already authorized by Congress on programs he dislikes, a move that is banned under current law and may be unconstitutional.
Closing the department would not by itself revoke the various laws that established federal funding for public schools and underserved school districts or for specific student populations, including those with disabilities. Furthermore, many education policies are controlled by other agencies, and the department does not oversee schools on military bases or in Native American territories.
The Education Department has already reoriented itself to pick up many of Mr. Trump’s goals by winding down investigations started under the previous administration; starting new ones reflecting its own priorities; rolling back protections for transgender students; and cracking down on diversity programs.
