this post was submitted on 04 Feb 2025
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Summary

The White House is drafting an executive order to dismantle the Department of Education, aligning with Trump's long-standing pledge.

However, Congress must approve the agency's abolition, making its passage unlikely despite GOP control. Critics, including the National Education Association, warn this move would harm students, increase costs, and weaken protections.

GOP lawmakers have repeatedly attempted to eliminate the department since its 1979 founding.

Trump also recently signed an order expanding school choice, reinforcing the Republican agenda of decentralizing education policy.

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[–] nifty@lemmy.world 4 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

This is one people should seriously protest to fucking stop. Education is the one thing that levels the playing field for people across different socioeconomic backgrounds. Get on the phone to your representatives, this is the main one they were working towards and wanted to distract from!

Education is the one thing that levels the playing field for people across different socioeconomic backgrounds.

Exactly, and that'll be why it's one of the first things they want to piss all over.

[–] Shuddle@lemmy.zip 62 points 2 days ago (3 children)

Almost forgot Congress was a thing since there's been little to no mention about them in this shit circus

[–] skozzii@lemmy.ca 10 points 1 day ago

Don't worry, Congress holds the purse/wallet so nothing can get done without their approval as they have the spending power. That is unless they hijack the payment systems to no longer require congress and making complete control one step closer...

Ohhhh... wait....

[–] Skyrmir@lemmy.world 19 points 2 days ago

That's by design, they stay silent and don't take the polling hit.

[–] GiddyGap@lemm.ee 1 points 1 day ago

The Republicans have all the power in Congress and they are all afraid of Trump.

[–] yarr@feddit.nl 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Hey evryone!! Big mooves are hapening in the world of Ed-U-Kashun! The Departmint of Edukation is gettin the boot!!! No more bossy beurocratz teling teechers what 2 do!!! Trumps doin it, an its about TIME!!

Thnik about it—why do we need a bunch of folks in Washintun teling local skools how 2 run??? It’s like they no better then us parints and edukaytors. Time too cut the kord and let fredom RING!!

But wate, some peepul are crying fowl!! The NEA an other groops are UPSET becuz they cant keep there grip on things. They want MORE RULEZ an HIGER TAXIS so they can stay in charge!?!? Can u beleev that?? It’s all about KEEPING POWER, NOT HELPIN KIDS!!!

Without the DOE skools can save monee an stop following outdate rulez!! Teechers can TEACH how THEY WANT and studants can LERN at THERE own pace!!! It’s like a fresh start 4 evryone!!!

And dont 4get Trumps skool choice oder!!! Now, local leeders can decide what wurks BEST for there kidz!! No more distunt beurocrats messing things UP!!

So, let’s MAKE IT HAPEN!!! The Dept of Edukashun is HISTORY!!! Skool choice is on the table, an local leeders are READY to take CHARGE!! Who needs a Dept of Ed when you got SMART FOLKS makin desishuns 4 ur kidz?? LETS GO EDUKASHUN FREDOM!!!

[–] Regrettable_incident@lemmy.world 1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Every classroom must have a portrait of trump.

[–] yarr@feddit.nl 0 points 1 day ago

Yes, the Great Leader must be appeased!

[–] Treczoks@lemmy.world 2 points 1 day ago

"We don't need no education" -- Pink Floyd, The Wall, 1979 & Donald Trump, Crazy Actionism, 2025

[–] stephfinitely@lemmy.world 2 points 1 day ago

Come on, other branches of government do your job. Even if you agree with the executive branch doesn't have this power.

[–] Maggoty@lemmy.world 21 points 2 days ago

If NBC thinks he needs an act of Congress then they haven't been paying paying attention to USAID.

Who the fuck am I kidding, they know damn well what's going on and refuse to print it.

[–] cultsuperstar@lemmy.world 37 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Keep people dumb. Write their own history to "educate" the dumb. Sounds about right.

[–] quixote84@midwest.social 7 points 2 days ago

For this reason, if you have anything with at least 32 GB of RAM and a GPU, you should get a copy of Ollama and test it out running a local copy of Deepseek. That's going to soon become the best 0 new dollars tool for access to education.

[–] prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone 46 points 2 days ago (2 children)

I was going to ask if this means I no longer have to pay back my student loans, but of course I know better than that.

[–] xenomor@lemmy.world 3 points 1 day ago (1 children)

The debt that the government owns would be sold to private lenders and the whole situation will get dramatically worse.

[–] prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

Yeah probably... I'm also ~1 year of payments away from Public Service Loan Forgiveness. Just waiting for the letter/email telling me they're clawing it back.

Most of my student loans are with a private lender anyway, and it's 1000x worse than the federal loans. They don't even have repayment plans. If you can't pay the minimum (which doesn't even cover the entire principal), well fuck you too bad

[–] conditional_soup@lemm.ee 23 points 2 days ago (2 children)

Shit is getting done so scattershot, I think there's a really, really good chance that a lot of records are going to fall through the cracks or "fall through the cracks" as different databases are deleted, offices closed, code based altered, and agencies demolished.

[–] VolumetricShitCompressor@lemmy.dbzer0.com 42 points 2 days ago (2 children)

Would be funny af if some madlad goes maliciouscompliance and deletes all records on student loans or something like that.

[–] bitjunkie@lemmy.world 11 points 2 days ago

please_god.png

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[–] RamenJunkie@midwest.social 10 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Thats the goal.

Evennif somehow there is another election, everything will be too broken to even begin to repair it.

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[–] YtA4QCam2A9j7EfTgHrH@infosec.pub 297 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (31 children)

Congress is required for all sorts of shit that Elon is doing but that isn’t stopping Elon.

Laws are not some sort of natural force. They are implemented by people and all of those people are either fascists or cowards.

Trumps immunity plus his pardon power make him king. All of his minions can do all the illegal things they want. Trump can then pardon them and he isn’t liable for their crimes if he is doing something roughly in line with his duties are President. John Roberts fucked us all.

The only way this is going to be solved is by people power. Organize. Fight these fascists.

[–] takeda@lemm.ee 69 points 3 days ago (1 children)

This is exactly why musk is not appointed, he can't be impeached and as you said DOJ and pardons will protect him.

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[–] DarkFuture@lemmy.world 106 points 2 days ago (1 children)

In case anyone is still wondering if Republicans are enemies of the United States of America, you need not wonder anymore.

[–] Jericho_Kane@lemmy.org 9 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Why use big words when small words do trick.

Soon enough, when you have to select a language on a devive, the difference between: english (uk) and english (american) will make a whole lot more sense.

[–] kent_eh@lemmy.ca 2 points 1 day ago

It would have been possible, for example, to say Big Brother is ungood. But this statement, which to an orthodox ear merely conveyed a self-evident absurdity, could not have been sustained by reasoned argument, because the necessary words were not available.

[–] madjo@feddit.nl 10 points 2 days ago (2 children)

And the sad part is that a lot of teachers voted for Cheetolini.

[–] kent_eh@lemmy.ca 3 points 1 day ago (1 children)

What possible reason could they have for voting so directly against their own interests?

[–] madjo@feddit.nl 3 points 1 day ago

My honest guess? A misinformation campaign and a complete misunderstanding of Cheetolini’s platform which had quite a few fill in the blanks type “policies”, that made people imagine whatever they wanted into his campaign promises.

[–] Akasazh@feddit.nl 6 points 2 days ago

that will... teach them?

[–] BmeBenji@lemm.ee 17 points 2 days ago

This CollegeHumor video was 8 years ahead of its time: If the Other Party Wins

[–] Treczoks@lemmy.world 205 points 3 days ago (4 children)

Education is Fascisms biggest enemy. That's why.

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[–] futatorius@lemm.ee 17 points 2 days ago (1 children)
[–] ChonkyOwlbear@lemmy.world 148 points 3 days ago (9 children)

It might be worth mentioning that Andrew Johnson signed the Department of Education into law in 1867. It was elevated to a cabinet position in 1979 by Carter from it's previous position within the Department of Health, Education, And Welfare.

The idea that the government has a constitutional interest in fostering the education of the public is NOT a new thing contrary to what conservatives would have you believe. An educated populace is an essential function of a representative democracy.

[–] Aceticon@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 1 day ago

Even the moneyed elites should be wary of this since even the regimes were money is the most concentrated in the fewest of hands are proportionally far poorer when their Education systems are bad, probably because o many of the higher value adding businesses require comparativelly well educated workers and even a lot of products require well educated users (who as consumers buy those products).

People who are illiterate, even if only functionally so, can't handle most modern devices, at work or at home.

At least up to a point, the level of Education of the populous is the difference between being a Latin America style Economy or being an European style one.

[–] YtA4QCam2A9j7EfTgHrH@infosec.pub 69 points 3 days ago (9 children)
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[–] meowmeowbeanz@sh.itjust.works 76 points 2 days ago (13 children)

The executive order’s a symbolic gesture—Congress won’t scrap the Department outright. But the subtext? Steady erosion. Shift student debt oversight to Treasury, pare back civil rights investigations, let federal education funds atrophy. States then fill the vacuum: red ones push vouchers, defund “woke” curricula, blue ones scramble to plug gaps.

The playbook’s transparent. Undermine trust in public institutions, then offer “choice” as salvation. Rural GOP districts take the bait, then recoil when their Title I lunches and special ed services evaporate. Even conservatives quietly rely on federal data systems and grant streams—hypocrisy’s baked in.

Latest school choice expansions? Distraction tactics. Real damage accrues in the margins: disabled students lose protections, civil rights complaints backlog, teacher retention plummets. ED’s survived 40 years of GOP vitriol because dismantling it’s all optics, no payoff.

Predictable cycle. Provoke outrage, let chaos incentivize privatization. Rinse, repeat.

[–] prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone 19 points 2 days ago (10 children)

The executive order’s a symbolic gesture—Congress won’t scrap the Department outright.

You're wrong. They will not wait for Congress to do anything.

Who the fuck is going to stop them, you?

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[–] Viking_Hippie@lemmy.dbzer0.com 88 points 3 days ago

The White House is drafting ~~an executive order~~ a royal decree to dismantle the Department of Education, aligning with Trump's ~~long-standing pledge~~ long con.

~~Critics~~ An overwhelming consensus of experts, including the National Education Association, warn this move would harm students, increase costs, and weaken protections.

Trump also recently signed ~~an order expanding school choice~~ a decree lowering educational standards, reinforcing the Republican agenda of ~~decentralizing education policy~~ dismantling public secular education in favor of religious and political indoctrination.

There, fixed the "we must obscure reality by using their terms so they won't come after us next" cowardice.

[–] echo@lemmings.world 73 points 3 days ago (2 children)

DoE gets in the way of funneling the money to the churches.

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[–] Mighty@lemmy.world 59 points 3 days ago (4 children)

I'm so sorry, Americans. I'm not sure who is even able to liberate your country. You and the Russians liberated the camps in Europe at the end of WW2, but who's there for you? I think you might need to liberate yourself. Again. I'm sorry. Good luck

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[–] w3dd1e@lemm.ee 41 points 3 days ago (14 children)

If the Federal Government doesn’t want to be responsible for anything, why even be a country? Each state be their own I guess /s

Also are they going to reduce taxes for all the cuts? Doubt it, but states would have to make increases to cover all the new work.

we live in the dumbest timeline.

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[–] ininewcrow@lemmy.ca 55 points 3 days ago (8 children)

Let em keep chopping off the federal government ..... at one point, individual states will start wondering why they are all interconnected in a union that doesn't do anything or provide any benefits any more and start acting like independent nations.

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