Trump set to move quickly against Education Department after Supreme Court green light

The Trump administration is moving full-steam ahead with plans to gut the Education Department after getting a green light from the Supreme Court.  

Conservatives are in celebration mode after the high court said the administration can lay off half of the department's workforce, arguing the move is long overdue and echoing President Trump's calls to return education to the states. 

Opponents, who are holding out hope for a win in the appeals court to which the case now returns, warn the layoffs will cause the Education Department to fail in its statutory obligations. 

After the high court ruling, the legal battle will go back to the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which will make the final determination of legality for the lower courts. After its decision, either party could potentially take the case back to the Supreme Court.

“Litigation will proceed, but the harm is already done and it's happening, and they're going to act quickly to implement it, and that cannot be undone. So, while this is a preliminary injunction that was stayed while the litigation continues, the harm is going to continue, and it is going to have a devastating impact,” said Shiwali Patel, senior director of Safe and Inclusive Schools for the National Women's Law Center. 

The Department of Education, which started its work in 1980, began this year with more than 4,000 employees. Trump has announced plans to fire more than 1,300 of them.

The president promised on the campaign trail to completely eliminate the department, but a complete shutdown of the Education Department is not possible without an act of Congress.  

Education advocates, however, argue his actions will force a de facto shutdown, and the liberal justices in their dissent wrote the court’s decision will cause the federal agency to fall short of its legal mandates.

“It hands the Executive the power to repeal statutes by firing all those necessary to carry them out,” wrote Justice Sonia Sotomayor, joined by Justices Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson.

“The majority is either willfully blind to the implications of its ruling or naive, but either way the threat to our Constitution’s separation of powers is grave,” they added.  

Trump and Education Secretary Linda McMahon quickly cheered the majority's decision.

"The United States Supreme Court has handed a Major Victory to Parents and Students across the Country, by declaring the Trump Administration may proceed on returning the functions of the Department of Education BACK TO THE STATES. Now, with this GREAT Supreme Court Decision, our Secretary of Education, Linda McMahon, may begin this very important process," Trump posted on Truth Social.  

Among the department's major functions, Trump has previously floated moving the responsibility of student loan management to the Small Business Administration, and programs for students with disabilities to the Department of Health and Human Services. Others have said the Office of Civil Rights should go to the Department of Justice.

McMahon said the department “will carry out the reduction in force to promote efficiency and accountability” but “will continue to perform all statutory duties while empowering families and teachers by reducing education bureaucracy.”

Supporters of the move are excited, arguing if the president wanted to completely eliminate the department, his actions do not match that goal so far.

“I think the president has authority to make decisions about the size of the federal workforce as long as he is continuing — thinks he can continue to execute the jobs that Congress gave him. I think that the opposition to his cuts were largely based on the argument that this is really just about eliminating the department, but I think the evidence is that the cuts weren't about eliminating the department,” said Neal McCluskey, director for the Center for Educational Freedom at the Cato Institute. 

McCluskey pointed to the Education Department rehiring dozens of people after the mass layoffs as evidence that suggests “the goal was not to destroy or eliminate the department by firing everybody.” 

But others feel the messaging from the Trump administration has hurt the cause of wanting to reform the Education Department. 

Beth Akers, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, has advocated for reforms such as the student loan portfolio moving to the Treasury Department. 

“I think there is a reasonable argument to be made for both downsizing the department, maybe shifting some of the responsibilities elsewhere, but I think the messaging coming from the administration of closing the department has kind of corrupted those ideas, because It feels like the ambition of the president is more of a political rhetoric than it is about making these necessary programs work better,” Akers said.  

"I think it’s unfortunate that something that has real credibility as a policy solution has been kind of taken over and driven by politics,” she added. 

While those against the Trump administration's reforms still have a shot in the appeals court, many are not confident after the Supreme Court ruling in which the conservative majority did not explain the reasoning behind their decision.

“I think, ultimately, their opinion on this ruling indicates how they will continue to rule until he explicitly violates the law,” said Alex Lundrigan, federal policy and advocacy manager at Young Invincibles. 

“I think it opens a larger conversation between Congress and the executive branch about, like, checks and balances in terms of ... if a president can just completely wipe out a department, except for name alone," he continued. "Congress might start to revisit how they are reauthorizing legislation that created some of these departments and ... enshrining more provisions that protect some of them from being stripped away, essentially."