The U.S. Department of Education will begin dismantling the U.S. Education Department on Tuesday, with parts of the agency moved to the Labor Department and offices elsewhere, according to the Washington Post. This is a highly illegal move, as a President cannot unilaterally decide to dismantle an agency created by Congress. But President Donald Trump chose a very convenient day to do so.
The Washington Post reports that it is still unclear which offices could be saved from DOE, but it could include the Office of Civil Rights, the Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services, the Office of Elementary and Secondary Education, and the Indian Education Program.
The social media accounts of the Department of Education and Education Secretary Linda McMahon shared a video with the caption.The clock is ticking…” The video features clips of Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush talking about how they wanted to dismantle the agency.
Just because previous presidents wanted to dismantle the agency doesn’t mean Trump is allowed to do so without Congressional approval. The fact that other presidents were unable to do so should provide some indication of how far Trump is operating outside the law.
Why is Trump stepping up his move on the Education Department today? As it happens, the House of Representatives is scheduled to vote on Tuesday to release the so-called Epstein files — documents held by the U.S. Justice Department about the late sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein, who died in prison in 2019. Trump has fought tooth and nail to keep the files from being released — perhaps because he was a close friend of Epstein — though he changed his tune on Sunday when it became clear the House vote was likely to pass.
Trump further wrote on Truth Social, “As I told the Fake News Media on Air Force One on Friday night, House Republicans should vote to release the Epstein files, because we have nothing to hide.”
It is not true that Trump said the files should be released on Friday while he was on Air Force One. In fact, when a Bloomberg reporter asked Trump about the files, he said, “Quiet! Quiet, piggy.”
Trump also said on Air Force One that it is the Democrats who should be investigated. The president earlier tweeted that he had ordered Attorney General Pam Bondi to investigate ties between Epstein and Bill Clinton, as well as other Democrats.
The White House reportedly believes they have found a solution when it comes to the illegal move to eliminate the Department of Education. Federal law requires all of these programs to be housed in the Department of Education. But the Washington Post reports that they are going to try to have other government agencies run Education Department programs “under a contract with the Department of Education.”
No one knows whether it will be allowed to stand, but USAID was similarly dismantled in late January and early February, just after Trump began his second term. Dozens of lawsuits were filed, but the judicial system is clearly not equipped to handle a president who breaks things and just deals with the consequences, as The New York Times recently noted. President Trump’s decision to destroy the East Wing of the White House in a surprise move is a perfect example of this.
The House is currently discussing a vote on the Epstein files, but even if they vote to release the files, it still needs to be taken up by the Senate. After this, it is also necessary to have the President’s signature on it. And even then, there’s the question of what Trump will actually allow to be released. Again, the President does not consider himself bound by the law. Congress could pass all the laws to force a release, but that doesn’t mean it wouldn’t be necessary.
It seems like abolishing the Department of Education would lead to a lot of lawsuits. Whether those lawsuits actually achieve anything is another question. Experts have pointed out that even if the courts found the dismantling of USAID illegal and ordered it to be reorganized, this is not something you can necessarily do. Most of the people who work at USAID have found new jobs and moved on with their lives.
It is much easier to destroy something than to rebuild it. And this is not just true of USAID, the Department of Education, and the East Wing. It is true that everything is being destroyed in America right now. And if you zoom out to as broad a historical view as possible, it will probably take generations to rebuild the things that are falling apart now.