Republicans set on eliminating the Department of Education have put forward legislation to dismantle the federal agency.
On Thursday, South Dakota Senator Mike Rounds introduced a bill to eliminate the Department of Education after President-elect Donald Trump backed closing the agency during his campaign.
"We want federal education dollars to follow the student rather than propping up a bloated and radical bureaucracy in Washington, D.C.," Trump said in October, adding, "We want to close the federal Department of Education."
Trump has also accused the agency of "indoctrinating young people with inappropriate racial, sexual, and political material."
The bill, titled the Returning Education to Our States Act, would redistribute federal programs from the Department of Education to other departments, including interior, treasury, health and human services, labor, and state.
In a statement, Rounds said that since the department's creation in 1979, it had grown into "an oversized bureaucracy with a budget that's 449 percent larger than it was at its founding." He also criticized its per-student spending given students' dropping standardized test scores. In fiscal year 2024, the department's allocation was $238 billion—less than 2 percent of the federal budget.
Rounds continued: "The federal Department of Education has never educated a single student, and it's long past time to end this bureaucratic Department that causes more harm than good. We all know local control is best when it comes to education. Everyone raised in South Dakota can think of a teacher who played a big part in their educational journey. Local school boards and state Departments of Education know best what their students need, not unelected bureaucrats in Washington, D.C.
"For years, I've worked toward removing the federal Department of Education. I'm pleased that President-elect Trump shares this vision, and I'm excited to work with him and Republican majorities in the Senate and House to make this a reality. This legislation is a roadmap to eliminating the federal Department of Education by practically rehoming these federal programs in the departments where they belong, which will be critical as we move into next year."
Earlier this week, Trump nominated Linda McMahon, who headed the Small Business Administration in his first term, to lead the Department of Education.
Trump said he chose McMahon to spearhead his administration's efforts to "send Education BACK TO THE STATES."
The bill is not expected to pass during the current session of Congress, as Democrats still control the Senate, and will likely be reintroduced next term. On Thursday, Representative Thomas Massie, a Republican from Kentucky, told ABC News that he would bring forward legislation to abolish the Education Department within the "first few weeks" of the 119th Congress.
"There'll be one sentence—only thing that will change is the date: The Department of Education shall terminate on December 31, 2026," Massie told the outlet.
While Republicans are set to take control of both chambers of Congress in January, it is still unlikely that the legislation will pass. The bill requires 60 votes to pass the Senate, meaning it would need support from Democrats, who vehemently oppose dismantling the department.
"There's no chance they're going to be at 60, and so it's going to be tough [to abolish the department legislatively]," Neal McCluskey, an education analyst at the Cato Institute, told ABC News.
This is not the first time Republicans have attempted to dismantle the Department of Education.
Last year, Massie attached an amendment to a bill to abolish the department. The bill failed to pass after 60 Republicans joined Democrats in the House to vote against it.
Republicans have floated the idea of dismantling the Education Department since its creation, with Ronald Reagan pushing for the department to be abolished during his presidential campaign in 1980. Bob Dole argued in favor of eliminating it during his 1996 presidential campaign against Bill Clinton, and Senators Ted Cruz and Rand Paul called for its elimination in 2015.
Arguments for eliminating the department have varied over time. Some Republicans believe the federal government should get out of education entirely, while others argue that the department should be transformed into a grant-making agency or have its programs reallocated to other agencies.
More recently, Republicans have accused the Education Department of pushing what they describe as "woke" political ideology on children, including discussions about gender and race.
The president-elect has not offered an in-depth outline for how his administration plans to dismantle the department. But Project 2025, which Trump disavowed during his campaign, outlined closing the Department of Education—proposing that civil rights violations become the jurisdiction of the Justice Department, that student loan matters fall under the Treasury Department, and that other responsibilities be left to the Department of Human and Health Services. Newsweek has contacted Trump's transition team for comment via email.
Some 44 percent of Americans have a favorable view of the Department of Education, according to a Pew Research survey released in August. However, there are wide partisan gaps in how the department is viewed—with 27 percent of surveyed Republicans viewing it as favorable compared to 62 percent of Democrats.
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