OAN Staff Brooke Mallory
4:50 PM – Thursday, November 20, 2025
U.S. Education Secretary Linda McMahon took to the White House briefing room podium to deliver a bold message to the remaining bureaucrats at her Department: President Donald Trump’s mandate is clear — “drain the swamp,” empower parents and U.S. states, and work yourselves out of a failing agency by dismantling the bloated federal education machine once and for all.
Many Americans argue that the Department of Education has failed the country, citing stagnant or worsening academic outcomes despite a massive increase in spending.
Inflation-adjusted per-pupil funding has roughly tripled since 1970, from about $6,500 to $17–18,000 today, and federal education spending has grown from virtually zero to tens of billions annually. Yet long-term NAEP scores for 17-year-olds in reading and math have remained essentially flat since the early 1970s.
Today, only about one-third of 4th and 8th graders are proficient in reading or math, with many large urban districts seeing fewer than 20–25% of students at grade level.
Critics contend that the department has federalized what was historically a state and local responsibility, layering on costly bureaucracy, compliance requirements, and a series of top-down initiatives — No Child Left Behind, Race to the Top, Common Core, and ESSA — that consumed resources while delivering little improvement and fueling administrative bloat instead of classroom results.
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Writing an opinion piece for USA TODAY, McMahon detailed her thoughts on the matter.
“Our nation just experienced the longest government shutdown in its history. The 43-day shutdown, which came smack in the middle of the fall semester, showed every family how unnecessary the federal education bureaucracy is to their children’s education. Students kept going to class. Teachers continued to get paid. There were no disruptions in sports seasons or bus routes.”
“The shutdown proved an argument that conservatives have been making for 45 years: The U.S. Department of Education is mostly a pass-through for funds that are best managed by the states,” she stated.
McMahon also addressed the recent changes at her department on Thursday — which includes shifting several programs to other federal agencies — while calling on Congress to make the changes permanent.
The Education Department is currently undergoing aggressive restructuring under the Trump administration, aligning with the GOP president’s long-standing pledge to dismantle the agency.
“My purpose here is to speak directly to the American families, not just you, but to the American families, about the work this administration is doing in education to reverse our national decline with a hard reset of our educational system. That reset was a top campaign promise from President Trump to send education back to the states and end Washington’s micromanagement of education once and for all,” McMahon said at the White House.
This effort accelerated following the resolution of a 43-day government shutdown on November 12th, the longest in U.S. history, which temporarily halted federal operations but has since been highlighted by the administration as justification for further downsizing.
McMahon reiterated that the current goal is to outsource most functions to other agencies, reduce federal bureaucracy, and devolve control to states — though full elimination still requires congressional approval.
“I’ve talked to dozens of members of Congress to explain to them exactly what we’re doing, to bring them up to speed and to say to them, ‘Look, when we have completed some of these transfers that work incredibly well, then we will be looking to Congress to codify those,’” McMahon added.
The remarks capped a whirlwind 48 hours that saw the Trump administration announce the transfer of more than $31 billion in federal education programs to four other cabinet agencies — the largest single step yet toward fulfilling Trump’s campaign promise to eliminate the department, created in 1979.
Transfers Already Underway
On Monday, the department signed six interagency agreements that immediately shift day-to-day control of major programs:
- Title I grants for low-income schools and most K-12 funding streams → Department of Labor
- TRIO programs and dozens of higher-education grants → Department of Labor
- Office of Indian Education → Department of the Interior
- Childcare support for student parents and foreign medical-school oversight → Health and Human Services
- Fulbright and international-education grants → Department of State
McMahon described the moves as “pilots” under existing law but made clear the endgame: permanent legislation that would leave the Department of Education as little more than a shell, if it survives at all. However, she still acknowledges that completely eliminating the department would take an act of Congress.
From WWE executive to U.S. Department of Education leader, Linda McMahon — who was confirmed on March 3rd in a party-line 51-45 Senate vote — has pursued the Trump administration’s mandate to dismantle the Department with characteristic intensity.
During an all-staff audio meeting obtained by Inside Higher Ed in late October this year, shortly after a second round of layoffs that cut an additional 465 positions, McMahon addressed the roughly 2,000 remaining employees, explaining that their “work now is to make this department obsolete.”
She has spent much of the fall on a 50-state “Return Education to the States” tour, showcasing local charter networks and apprenticeship programs while maintaining that federal oversight has coincided with a steep decline in American student performance.
The future of politically sensitive offices — including the Office for Civil Rights, Federal Student Aid (which manages $1.6 trillion in loans), and special-education programs under IDEA — remains undecided, though administration officials have floated moving disability services to HHS.
Federal education funding remains secure only through mid-January under the recently passed continuing resolution.
In the weeks ahead, McMahon has pledged to aggressively lobby House and Senate Republicans to enshrine the department’s program transfers into the upcoming fiscal-year budget, making the changes permanent through legislation.
She appears determined to finish what President Trump started — even if it means presiding over the end of her own agency.
“The Trump Administration is taking bold action to break up the federal education bureaucracy and return education to the states,” said U.S. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon. “Cutting through layers of red tape in Washington is one essential piece of our final mission. As we partner with these agencies to improve federal programs, we will continue to gather best practices in each state through our 50-state tour, empower local leaders in K-12 education, restore excellence to higher education, and work with Congress to codify these reforms. Together, we will refocus education on students, families, and schools – ensuring federal taxpayer spending is supporting a world-class education system.”
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