How will the Education Closures affect Americans?
US President Donald Trump moved to remove the Department of Education. But he cannot close his agency without legislation.
WASHINGTON – The Supreme Court, ideologically split on July 14, has allowed the Trump administration to fire hundreds of workers from the education sector and continue other efforts to dismantle the agency.
The three Liberal Justice in the Court opposed President Donald Trump’s latest victory in the High Court, the order.
Judge Sonia Sotomayor said the majority handed Trump the power to repeal the law passed by Congress to “dismiss everything necessary to carry out them.”
“The majority are deliberately blind to the meaning of that arbitration or naiveness,” Sotomayor wrote.
The majority did not explain the decision in a short, unsigned order.
The decision comes a week after the court allowed the administration to move forward with massive staffing cuts across multiple agencies.
Trump is trying to fulfill his campaign promise to end the education sector and move school policies to the state.
“Today, the Supreme Court has once again confirmed what is obvious. As executive director, the US President has the ultimate authority to make decisions about the level of staffing, management organizations, and day-to-day operations of federal agencies,” Education Secretary Linda McMahon said in a statement.
She said the administration will continue to carry out the education-related functions needed by the law and “empower families and teachers by reducing the education bureaucracy.”
Workers in the education sector took administrative leave in March and stopped receiving their salary on June 9th. The judges then intervened at the request of Democratic-led states, school districts and teacher unions. The government has spent more than $7 million a month continuing to pay employees who cannot work, according to the U.S. Government Employee Federation.
Massachusetts US District Judge Myong Joun said the White House decision to fire more than 1,300 workers has prevented the federal government from effectively implementing legally necessary programs and services. Such changes were ruled in May by Joun without approval from the Congress, which created the department in 1979.
The Boston-based First Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the decision. The court said the administration did not provide evidence to counter the “recorded findings on the impact of obstacles” of mass shootings and the transfer of some functions to other agencies.
The Justice Department said the constitution gives the administrative bodies, not the courts, the authority to determine the number of employees needed.
“The Department of Education has determined that it can be carried out with staff who have reduced legally mandatory functions. We have determined that many discretionary functions are left to the state,” Attorney General John Saur told the Supreme Court.
The executive order signed by Trump in March directed McMahon to “promote the closure of the Department of Education.”
Republicans have accused the federal government of holding too much power over local and state education policies, even though the federal government does not control school curriculum.
McMahon announced that a combination of massive layoffs and voluntary acquisitions would eliminate about half of the agency’s workforce. This would have cut staff from 4,133 workers to 2,183 when Trump began his second term in January.
The administration also hopes that the Small Business Bureau will take over student loans and move special education services to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
Joun’s May 22 order required the administration to block the transfer of those functions and revive workers fired by the department.
The appeals court said Trump doesn’t need to employ as many education workers as his previous administrations, but he can’t cut down as many functions as Congress intended.
The states challenging the move said the administration has eliminated almost every worker who proves that universities and universities are eligible for federal student aid programs. And it told the Supreme Court that lawyers in New York and other states disrupted the department responsible for the data used to allocate billions of dollars to the state.
A lawyer for the Democracy Forward Foundation told the Supreme Court.
“After the court’s decision, Skye Peryman, president and CEO of Democracy Forward, will actively pursue all legal options to ensure that the lawsuit progresses and ensure that every child in this country has access to the public education they deserve.”
The Justice Department told the Supreme Court that the harm to the government as workers have to be rehired as the lawsuit continues is greater than the harm challengers said they would suffer a decline in departmental services. The department also opposed the challenges for procedural reasons.
