Secretary of Education Linda McMahon released her budget proposal for next year, and it’s as bad as expected.
Carol Burris, executive director of the Network for Public Education, reviewed the budget and concluded that it shows a reckless disregard for the neediest students and schools and outright hostility towards students who want to go to college.
We know that Trump “loves the uneducated.” Secretary McMahon wants more of them.
Burris sent out the following alert:
Linda McMahon, handpicked by Donald Trump to lead the U.S. Department of Education, has just released the most brutal, calculated, and destructive education budget in the Department’s history.
She proposes eliminating $8.5 billion in Congressionally funded programs—28 in total—abolishing 10 outright and shoving the other 18 into a $2 billion block grant. That’s $4.5 billion less than those 18 programs received last year.
Tell Congress: Stop McMahon From Destroying Our Public Schools
And it gets worse: States are banned from using the block grant to support the following programs funded by Congress:
- Aid for migrant children whose families move frequently for agricultural work
- English Language Acquisition grants for emerging English learners
- Community schools offering wraparound services
- Grants to improve teacher effectiveness and leadership
- Innovation and research for school improvement
- Comprehensive Centers, including those serving students with disabilities
- Technical assistance for desegregation
- The Ready to Learn program for young children
These aren’t just budget cuts—they’re targeted strikes.
McMahon justifies cutting support for migrant children by falsely claiming the program “encourages ineligible non-citizens to access taxpayer dollars.” That is a lie. Most migrant farmworkers are U.S. citizens or have H-2A visas. They feed this nation with their backbreaking labor.
The attack continues for opportunity for higher education:
- Pell Grants are slashed by $1,400 on average; the maximum grant drops from $7,395 to $5,710
- Federal Work-Study loses $1 billion—an 80% cut
- TRIO programs, which support college-readiness and support for low-income students, veterans, and students with disabilities, are eliminated
- Campus child care programs for student-parents are defunded
In all, $1.67 billion in student college assistance is gone—wiped out on top of individual Pell grant cuts.
And yet, McMahon increased funding for the federal Charter Schools Program to half a billion dollars for a sector that saw an increase of only eleven schools last year. Meanwhile, her allies in Congress are pushing a $5 billion private school and homeschool voucher scheme through the so-called Educational Choice for Children Act (ECCA).
And despite reducing Department staff by 50%, she only cuts the personnel budget by 10%.
This is not budgeting. It is a war on public education.
This is a blueprint for privatization, cruelty, and the systematic dismantling of opportunity for America’s children.
We cannot let it stand.
Raise your voice. Share this letter: https://networkforpubliceducation.org/tell-congress-dont-let-linda-mcmahon-slash-funding-for-children-college-students-and-veterans-to-fund-school-choice/ Call Congress.
Let Congress know that will not sit silently while they dismantle our children’s future.
Thank you for all you do,
Carol Burris
Network for Public Education Executive Director
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