The Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) on Thursday strongly condemned President Trump’s govt order to dismantle the Division of Training, saying the transfer will solely damage the nation’s public faculty system.
“Despite ongoing calls from the American people for the Trump Administration to keep its promise to lower the costs of living, President Trump and Elon Musk are instead continuing their rampage against career civil servants and institutions that faithfully serve the needs of the American people,” Rep. Yvette Clarke (D-N.Y.), chair of the CBC, stated in an announcement.
“Nearly every family, in every state, in every district, and in every zip code can understand the vital role the Department of Education plays in supporting students and ensuring equal access to high-quality learning opportunities for our children,” she added. “President Trump’s executive order will lessen the department’s resources and put pressure on already overburdened school systems.”
Trump signed an govt order Thursday directing Training Secretary Linda McMahon to do all she will be able to to eradicate the division. Already, 1,315 staffers on the division have been laid off, whereas a whole lot of others had been beforehand placed on go away or took buyout choices.
However the CBC stated the division’s elimination would exacerbate racial disparities in training, together with problems with segregation.
“In 1954, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Brown v. Board of Education that the ‘separate but equal’ doctrine established in Plessy v. Ferguson was unconstitutional. In the decades since, the Department of Education has played a vital role in ensuring equal access to education and enforcing desegregation laws,” Clarke stated.
“Despite this important and continuing work, challenges in education persist. Today, racial segregation is increasing in our schools. President Trump’s executive actions to further dismantle the Department of Education will make our schools more segregated and unequal.”
A lot of the inequality is seen by funding.
A CBS report discovered that, from 2015-20, districts made up of at the least 80 % Black college students invested solely about half as a lot cash in buildings than those who had lower than 20 % of Black college students enrolled. The disparities had been partially as a result of districts which can be at the least 80 % Black acquired solely a few quarter of the cash in comparison with these with fewer Black college students.
Black educators started sounding the alarm about what might be misplaced with the closure of the company again in February, when Trump first started escalating talks of eliminating the division.
Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz informed MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow that the Thursday order locations America “back in an area where we can segregate.”
“They want to make this about bureaucracy and cutting. This is about children. This is about broadband access in their schools,” stated Walz, the previous Democratic vice presidential nominee. “That is in regards to the analysis you had been speaking about pedagogy, issues that we be taught, after which it’s in regards to the civil rights division on the Division of Training that makes positive that we don’t have a state of affairs the place a Ruby Bridges is escorted to high school with police. And so we’re again in an space the place we are able to segregate. And he is aware of, he is aware of, that curriculums and people selections are made on an area foundation, however they muddy the waters.”
White Home press secretary Karoline Leavitt stated Thursday all of the “critical functions” of the Division of Training will stay in place.
However the CBC expressed issues for the standing of traditionally Black faculties and universities if the division is dismantled, together with Pell Grants, college students with particular wants, decrease revenue communities, English as a second language college students, and Title VI and Title IX legal guidelines that prohibit discrimination in education schemes and actions based mostly on race and gender.
Regardless of Trump’s order, solely Congress can absolutely abolish the division. Republican lawmakers in each chambers have proposed payments to wind down the federal company, however they’ve little likelihood of getting the mandatory 60 votes within the Senate.
Now, the CBC is looking on Republicans to guard the company.
“When the difficulty of abolishing the Division of Training got here earlier than the Home final Congress, 60 Republicans joined Democrats in voting it down. We’re calling on Republicans to face up and demand that President Trump and Elon Musk instantly rescind this govt order which can damage our nation’s public faculty programs,” it says.
