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The Education Department said on Nov. 18 that it plans to shift some of it biggest grant programs to the Department of Labor and other federal agencies
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The move will end the Education Department’s role in supporting academics at K-12 schools and in expanding access to college
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Education Secretary Linda McMahon said the plan would help with “cutting through layers of red tape in Washington”
The U.S. Education Department announced on Tuesday, Nov. 18, that it is handing over some of its biggest grant programs to the Department of Labor and other federal agencies as the Trump administration accelerates its plan to shut down the department.
As part of six new interagency agreements, the Department of Labor will now handle some of the largest federal funding streams for K-12 schools. The changes will end the Education Department’s role in supporting academics at K-12 schools and in expanding access to college.
The departments of Health and Human Services, Interior and State will also be involved in the efforts to “break up the federal education bureaucracy, ensure efficient delivery of funded programs, activities, and move closer to fulfilling the President’s promise to return education to the states,” the department said on Tuesday.
The six interagency agreements are as follows: Elementary and Secondary Education Partnership, Postsecondary Education Partnership, Indian Education Partnership, Foreign Medical Accreditation Partnership, Child Care Access Means Parents in School Partnership and International Education and Foreign Language Studies Partnership.
President Donald Trump signed an executive order in March for the dismantling of the agency and directed Education Secretary Linda McMahon to take the necessary steps to dissolve the department to the extent that she could, a move that has been opposed by teachers’ unions.
Formally dismantling would require an act of Congress, which created the department in 1979 under former President Jimmy Carter.
The Education Department has been a longtime target of conservatives including Trump, who has called the department “ineffective” and claimed it has been “infiltrated” by radicals. Trump’s former education secretary, Betsy DeVos, said herself in 2022 that the department “should not exist.”
SAUL LOEB/AFP/Getty
Donald Trump speaks to the media after signing executive orders relating to higher education on April 23, 2025
“The Trump Administration is taking bold action to break up the federal education bureaucracy and return education to the states,” McMahon said in a statement included on Tuesday. “Cutting through layers of red tape in Washington is one essential piece of our final mission.”
McMahon said the agencies will work with Congress to codify these reforms. It is unclear whether the changes will lead to further job cuts within the Education Department, which has already been impacted by mass layoffs.
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After McMahon was sworn in as secretary in March, she said she hoped to “overhaul” the department in a “last chance to restore the culture of liberty and excellence that made American education great.”
Plans for the Tuesday announcement were first reported by The Washington Post. Ahead of the announcement, McMahon and the department’s official X accounts posted a video of prominent Republicans, including former President Ronald Reagan and Sen. Bob Dole, expressing support for dissolving the Education Department dating back to 1980, when the department began operations.
Read the original article on People
