On Thursday afternoon, President Trump signed an executive order abolishing the Department of Education.
"Today, we take a very historic action that was 45 years in the making. In a few moments, I will sign an executive order to begin eliminating the federal Department of Education once and for all," he said. "And it sounds strange, doesn't it? Department of Education, we're going to eliminate it. And everybody knows it's right, and the Democrats know it's right. And I hope they're going to be voting for it because, ultimately, it may come before them. But everybody knows it's right, and we have to get our children educated. We're not doing well with the world of education in this country, and we haven't for a long time."
Trump then gave a shout-out to Linda McMahon, who Trump said will hopefully be "our last secretary of Education."
He then pointed out that when President Carter created the federal education department in 1979, "It was opposed by members of his own cabinet, as well as the American Federation of Teachers, the New York Times editorial board, and the famed Democrat, Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan."
"History has proven them right," Trump said. "Absolutely right."
The department was actually a gift to teachers' unions when Carter's approval ratings were tanking below 30%. The department has overseen decades of declining American educational performance while burning through more than $3 trillion of taxpayer dollars.
"After 45 years, the United States spends more money on education by far than any other country and spends, likewise, by far, more money per pupil than any country," Trump continued. "And it's not even close. But yet we rank near the bottom of the list in terms of success."
Trump continued with his blistering critique of the U.S. education system, highlighting its failures despite skyrocketing spending. “You don’t want the most money spent per pupil, and you’re at the bottom of the list,” he said. “And that’s where we are, like it or not, and we’ve been there for a long time.”
Trump pointed to alarming statistics: “Seventy percent of eighth graders are not proficient in either reading or in math." Even more troubling, “Forty percent of fourth graders lack even basic reading skills, can’t read.” He noted that public school students today perform worse in reading than when the Department of Education was created.
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The president singled out Baltimore as an example of the system’s failure. “Forty percent of the high schools have zero students who can do basic mathematics, not even the very simplest of mathematics,” he said. “I said, give me your definition of basic, and they’re talking about, like, adding a few numbers together.”
Despite these failures, Trump highlighted the department’s ballooning budget. “The department’s discretionary budget has exploded by 600% in a very short period of time,” he said. Meanwhile, federal education bureaucrats occupy buildings across Washington, D.C. “I ride through the streets of Washington and it says Department of Education, Department of Education. I said, how do you fill those buildings? It’s crazy what’s happened over the years.”
Trump touted his administration’s success in slashing bureaucracy. “We’ve cut the number of bureaucrats in half. Fifty percent have taken [buyout] offers, which is great. Thank you.” He reassured that essential programs like Pell Grants, Title I funding, and resources for children with disabilities “will be preserved in full and redistributed to various other agencies and departments that will take very good care of them.”
However, Trump made his ultimate goal clear: “My administration will take all lawful steps to shut down the department. We’re going to shut it down and shut it down as quickly as possible. It’s doing us no good.”
Trump emphasized that education should be returned to the states. “Some of the governors here are so happy about this. They want education to come back to them, to come back to the states, and they’re going to do a phenomenal job.”
Trump also dismissed the idea that large populations make reform impossible, citing international examples. “You know, if you look, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, I have to tell you, I give them a lot of credit. China’s top 10. And so we can’t now say that bigness is making it impossible to educate because China is very big.”
With this bold move, Trump is setting the stage for a historic transformation of education in America, shifting power away from federal bureaucrats and back to the states.
Here's the text of the executive order:
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Trump personally signed the executive order, flanked by school children sitting in desks. No autopen was used.
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