“Federal education policy should be limited and, ultimately, the federal Department of Education should be eliminated.” (Project 2025, Section 3.2: Department of Education, Lindsey Burke, page 351, paragraph 1.)

This is literally the first sentence of this section.

The rest of Burke’s stated mission advocates for what’s called “school choice”, where parents have the option to direct their childrens’ share of education funding through an education savings account – funded largely by state and local taxpayers – to a school of their choice.

As I touched on in the previous section¹, most who have written about the idea that Republicans are going to shut down the Department of Education don’t believe that it will happen.

“…surveys [also] suggest that a majority of Republicans think the federal government should spend more on education, which highlights just how difficult the practical politics of this would be. [Source]²

But what if they did?

The big question is, what do they mean by “eliminate”? Do they mean eliminating all of the programs altogether, or does it mean moving some or all of the programs to other federal entities? Keep in mind that their four biggest programs are student loans for college and other education-related costs, Pell Grants (need-based grants for low-income undergraduate students), IDEA (ensures that children with disabilities get a fair and equal public education that meets their needs), and Title I, which provides financial assistance to schools with high percentages of low-income students, ensuring that they, too, receive a quality public education.

Right away, we can see that a total elimination disproportionately affects the poor, working poor, and disabled, as well as 51+% of college students³, who borrow federal money to attend school.

Rick Hess, quoted above, doesn’t seem to think most lawmakers will be willing to call for slashing, much less eliminating federal aid for poor and disabled kids. I say, he underestimates the current Republican party.

In fact, in February 2023, eight months before the above article was written, House Republican Barry More (R-AL) sponsored and introduced a bill to eliminate the Department of Education⁴, other than the Pell Grant Program and the Direct Loan Program (student loans), which were to be moved to the Department of the Treasury; a fact Hess overlooks when he reassures us that there’s nothing to worry about. (If you’re keeping score, Moore’s bill would cut all federal funding for poor and disabled K-12 children and give it to their individual states.) Moore’s home state, Alabama, can scarcely afford to cut funding – it already ranks 5th worst in the nation⁵ for education.

Still other politicians (Ted Cruz⁶ comes to mind) have argued for shutting down the whole thing.

Holt points out a big issue with shutting it down entirely: “But the biggest question mark is what to do with the 1.2 trillion dollar loan portfolio that the Department of Education currently administers. The easiest option, administratively, is to forgive all of the debt, but I’m guessing [Republicans] want those dollars back. The other option would be to sell the entire portfolio in the private market. Given how risky the portfolio is – the generous terms like Income-Based Repayment that must be offered for every loan, the decreased powers the private entity would have to claw back the dollars (no more garnishing tax refunds), the new infrastructure required of the private entity to administer the program, and the teams of lawyers and investment bankers needed to organize an auction, the government would almost certainly lose money from selling the portfolio. The last option, of course, would be to move the loan portfolio to another entity, like the Department of Treasury, but, again, that feels like cheating.”

House Republican Thomas Massie (R-KY) also introduced a bill to abolish the DoE⁷, which read, in its entirety (yes, really), “The Department of Education shall terminate on December 31, 2023.” Obviously that one didn’t happen. It was co-sponsored by Rep. Andy Biggs (R-AZ), Rep. Dan Bishop (R-NC), Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-CO), Rep. Eric Burlison (R-MO), Rep. Harriet Hageman (R-WY), Rep. Rich McCormick (R-GA), Rep. Mary Miller (R-IL), and Rep. Chip Roy (R-TX).

So what would moving funding to the states mean for education?

First, we’d have to trust that superintendents would use the money wisely, for what best benefits students. But we’d be eliminating federal oversight to make sure of this, so no guarantees there. Before that, we’re assuming that states divided the money fairly and equitably among school districts, rather than the wealthy lobbying for more than their fair share and succeeding. Nobody who has proposed eliminating the DoE has included any way they’d be making sure that schools districts are actually serving their students. That’s a big problem. Simply abolishing the DoE doesn’t actually advance school choice. You have to have a plan for that, or states would have to have their own plans for that. Less oversight would also lead to inconsistent special education services and fragmented educational policies between schools, school districts, and states.

The DoE also does things like monitor school performance, collect data, and promote evidence-based practices. There would be no guarantee that individual states would do any of those things, leading to not only a broader disparity in the quality of a public education between states (not that you’d know about it, if you’re not monitoring), but not all states would need to “promote evidence-based practices”, which includes things like early identification and support for students with learning and behavioral needs and other strategies that improve student outcomes.

More broadly, states would no longer have to adhere to Title IX rules that provide greater and explicit protections for LGBTQ+ students. Republican states have already sued to block these⁸, so it’s not farfetched to assume that some states will simply ignore these rules and allow schools to discriminate against and terrorize these students, to say nothing of the potential results of eliminating federal oversight for racial discrimination. (Spoiler: Burke explicitly argues for this later in this section. Being able to legally discriminate is something she’s gleeful about. It’s almost one of the primary reasons she has for eliminating the DoE.)

So what does Trump say about abolishing the Department of Education? From the above linked article:

“In his conversation with Musk that aired on X, the social media platform previously known as Twitter, Trump said the U.S. had a “horrible” education ranking at the bottom of developed countries while spending the most.

It’s not totally clear what sources Trump was using. On recent international tests, the U.S. ranked sixth in reading, 10th in science, and 26th in math among 81 countries. Older test results show the U.S. ranked lower, especially in math. The U.S. does spend more per-pupil than most developed nations, including many that score better on key measures.

Trump said some states won’t do well, but many would do a better job on their own while spending less money.

“Of the 50, I would bet that 35 would do great, and 15 of them or 20 of them would be as good as Norway,” Trump told Musk. “You know Norway is considered great.”

He said the federal government could provide “a little monitor. You want to make sure they are teaching English, as an example. Give us a little English, right?”

Trump’s campaign did not respond to a request to elaborate on the candidate’s plans.”

“Are schools teaching English” is a low bar to clear. It’s also apparent that neither he, nor his campaign, have any real plans beyond destruction, nor any remark about it that isn’t garbled bluster. What happens to the 15 states he estimated “would not do great”? Screw the kids in those states, right? They don’t need a quality education. Pay attention to what he’s saying here, though – he’s acknowledging that he KNOWS that this will result in a huge disparity between the quality of education that individual states are able to offer – he just doesn’t care.

What would this mean for teachers? 

The Center for American Progress estimates that shuttering the DoE would decimate more than 180,000 teacher positions and negatively affect the academic outcomes of 2.8 million vulnerable students across the country. The loss of 180,000 teacher positions represents 5.64% of the teacher workforce nationally and affects 2.8 million students, due to the phasing out of Title I funding. In some states, such as Alabama, Arizona, Mississippi, Nevada, and Florida, nearly 10 percent teacher jobs would be lost. Louisiana would experience the greatest impact, with more than 12 percent of teaching positions eliminated. [Source]⁹