Trump Orders Education Dept. to Assist Its Own Suicide
The unironically anti-education president just launched the biggest assault on schools that didn't involve a literal gun
Mar. 20: Trump tells Education Department pencils down … The Social Security phone lines are dead in a morbid foreshadowing for its recipients … Town halls are uniting America against every single person in Congress … Trump cuts millions in support for poor people and businesspeople and even poor businesspeople …
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Pres. Donald Trump today is issuing an executive order directing the Education Department to kill itself. Trump’s ongoing campaign against Education is part of his curriculum on metaphors that are too on-the-nose.
The executive order doesn’t go quite so far as shutting the department down. Instead, it directs Education Secretary Linda McMahon, a rich person, “to facilitate the closure” of the department. Why not just close it? Because that’d be illegal. And illegal things are still against the law.
Only an act of Congress can close a federal agency created by an act of Congress, according to “judges.” Which hasn’t stopped Trump from moving forward with halving the Education Department’s staff. But the executive order does reflect acknowledgment of Congress’s role, calling on lawmakers to make the defenestration official, preventing future generations from learning what defenestration means1.
Bizarrely, Trump’s order tells McMahon to continue “to ensure the effective and uninterrupted delivery of services, programs, and benefits on which Americans rely.” While preparing to stop.
The department oversees about $1.6 trillion in student loans. Trump mocked Pres. Joe Biden for eliminating and mitigating student debt, a massive economic burden for millions of Americans that’s both a drag on the economy and a drag2. Although frequently thwarted by Republican judges, Biden succeeded in forgiving more than $175 billion in debt for more than 4.8 million borrowers.
Trump’s plan to address the still-remaining, still-crushing student debt for millions more has been to say the dog ate his homework. Meaning: He has no plan.
The Department of Education is also tasked with protecting civil rights in schools. Historically that has meant addressing discrimination that is real against LGBTQ+ and non-white students. Trump has redepurposed the department to focus on protecting against antisemitic acts such as criticizing the current Israeli government, protecting the feelings of white people, and addressing how angry transgender girls and women make Trump feel because he’s not sure how to abuse them.
Although most schools don’t get a big part of their small budgets from the federal government, schools with more poor and disabled kids rely on federal funds disproportionately. That includes money for school meals and to assist homeless students.
Trump obviously hasn’t bothered to explain how that money would still get distributed, but the options are basically to transfer that function to another agency and/or ultimately just have someone write no-strings checks to states that can then choose to use the money to help poor and disabled kids by giving them less food and more Jesus.
So why kill the department if the federal government will still, in theory, deliver its services, programs, and benefits? Because it also, to some measure, protects kids from shitty management at the state level.
During his campaign, Trump vowed to “send [education] back to the states, where it belongs.” This has been the position of Confederacy lawmakers since they were Democrats. As your still-learning TFN discovered in a deep dive last year, the department’s roots go back to the Civil of course War and its original mission to ensure educational fairness for Black of course students.
By protecting them from shitty states.
Hilariously, Trump has actually expanded at least one federal education function: Propaganda! Trump ordered the department to promote “patriotic” education so that students will unquestioningly love the country whose government they want to destroy.
As usual, instead of doing the politically smart — but boring and emotionally unsatisfying — thing of just attritioning federal education to death via a million cuts, Trump is increasing the prospects of widespread political blowback. During the administrations of Biden and the less-crazy-by-comparison first Trump term, congressional Republicans on multiple occasions broke ranks with their party to defend the department.
Of course, if learning history teaches us anything, it’s that things change. Republicans who didn’t cave to Trump before are now. But those who once defended the department and don’t protect it now can expect to enjoy vocal feedback at their next town halls (see below).
WHAT TRUMP IS GIVING TO SCHOOLS: ARMED CONVICTS Historically, TFN has been pro-restoring rights of criminal convicts who’ve done their time, paid their price, etc.
That’s a lot less true when we’re talking about rights that are made up, like the individual right to gun ownership. Which is a warning that the following news blows, will blow away gun nuts, and will lead to innocent victims getting blown away:
The Trump Justice Department is working on a new regulation to be published today that would lead to letting convicted criminals once again enjoy those fictional individual rights to gun ownership.
The move was prompted, apparently, by Mel Gibson’s battle to get his guns back after his conviction for battery against an ex-girlfriend. Because America definitely voted for Mel Gibson to have guns.
Trump Launches Campaign to Gut Social Security By Calling It Saving Social Security
The Social Security Administration will no longer allow recipients to verify their identities by phone, because that system is susceptible to fraud has been working successfully for decades.
Instead, the elderly and disabled will have to prove their eligibility by going online to use websites they may not be able to use or simply by going to a field office the way disabled and elderly people can easily do because it’s easy for them.
In a related story, Pres. Donald Trump is closing Social Security field offices. (Here’s a (growing) list. Suck it, Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Montana, North Carolina, North Dakota, Nevada, Ohio, Oklahoma, Texas, West Virginia, Wyoming and only two blue states: Colorado and New York.)
Acting Commissioner Leland Dudek, whose name is thought to have been created for a 1980s movie villain, said that the changes would save $100 million in “direct deposit fraud” that oddly adds up to a very round number. The changes — which the Washington Post falsely calls “anti-fraud” measures, which is a fraud — would also cost 4.4 million people every year all the pain-in-the-assery associated with the elderly or disabled trying to get their elderly or disabled asses to one of the remaining field offices.
Dudek swore on Aleister Crowley’s Bible that if the changes are “to the detriment of the citizens we serve, we will take actions,” presumably including executing anyone who claims they’re being detrimented. (Dudek, by the way, has admitted using his office to punish Maine because he “was upset with the governor’s treatment of the president” when she stood up to the asshole’s bullying.)
Protecting Americans from non-existent threats is a time-honored method of executing real threats against Americans, such as:
Making it harder to vote in the name of fighting statistically insignificant voter fraud.
Making it harder to have an economy or a decent country in the name of fighting fictional invasions.
Making it harder for poor people to get food aid in the name of preventing people from getting food aid because they don’t deserve to, uh, eat?
Making it harder for people to qualify for Medicaid so that they don’t waste federal dollars by not dying.
Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) called it “a full-blown attack on Social Security,” without identifying a single thing Democrats will do about it, suggesting that the party has fully blown its mandate to fight back. (See here for more on-Gillibrand capitulation.)
WHO IS FIGHTING BACK? The Social Security cuts and Education Department attack will draw legal challenges. The Washington Post is tracking all of that pushback here (gift link because Newsfuckers know that journalism should be accessible to everyone).
More Town-Hall Fun and a Shocking Twist
Two more congressional Republicans have had rare encounters in the wild with constituents who aren’t banks, far-right Christians, or conspiracy loons. And the congressional Republicans didn’t like it.
Rep. Mike Flood (R-NE) held a town hall in Columbus, NE, on Tuesday against the advice of antidemocratic House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA), who wants his caucus staying as far away as possible from voters and humans generally.
Flood was hit with a, um, wave of criticism about tariffs, Elon Musk, Ukraine, and himself. When asked about cuts to Medicare, Flood responded “Let’s remain calm [about my efforts to stop supporting medical care for millions of needy Americans without which they’ll get sick and/or die and/or go bankrupt.]”
Weirdly, Flood’s voters also did not remain calm when he said “I support Elon Musk and DOGE,” showering him with a synonym for flood of boos and thumbs-downs.
Gratifyingly, his Nebraska constituents also aren’t buying the standard “waste, fraud, and abuse” lie justifying wholesale cuts. When Flood said, “[T]his is the process that we are using to find waste, fraud, and abuse,” the town hall erupted in yelling and more boos, perhaps understanding that Republicans shouldn’t have to “find” waste or fraud if they’re already claiming it exists, because logic and the sequential nature of causality.
Rep. Chuck Edwards (R-NC) has been getting his own boisterous/enraged response when defying Johnson’s order to fuck around but not find out. And it’s not just Republicans. In that surprise twist TFN just headlined, Democrats have been surprised by the responses at their town halls, too…
In Shocking Twist, Democratic Voters Are Also Mad
Congressional Democrats are also on recess, and they thought it’d be a good idea to hold town halls to whip up opposition to terrible Republican shit. Y’know, so that their voters would, uh, pressure their representatives to do more, I guess?
Which is exactly what happened!
And so, Politico reports, Democratic town halls intended to spotlight how Republicans are sucking have become sprawling forums about how congressional Democrats are sucking at fighting Republican sucking.
On Sunday, Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR) and Rep. Janelle Bynum (D-OR) heard from one attendee who was “so pissed off right now at the leadership in the United States Senate that they are not willing to step up and fight.”
On Monday, Sens. Ruben Gallego (D-AZ) and Mark Kelly (D-AZ) held a forum about how bad Republicans are and fielded questions about how bad Democrats are. One attendee asked them whether they’d “support removing” Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) for helping the GOP pass its new budget bill.
On Tuesday in Maryland, one woman was made to leave a Democratic town hall after shouting at Rep. Glenn Ivey (D-MD): “You’re not fighting!” (Ivey has said he thinks it may be time for Schumer to step down as leader.)
Also on Tuesday, Sen. Peter Welch (D-VT) was told by a voter that “Schumer has done what I think is the most destructive thing that he could possibly do as Democratic leader.”
Ironically, senators are taking heat for Schumer because he decided to take heat for them. Instead of leading.
As I’ve punditized, Schumer was in some measure covering for Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY), who pushed Democrats to support the GOP bill, and the fact that Schumer covers for them is precisely why Senate Democrats on both sides of the bill continue to support him.
If supporting him causes them political pain, however, then Schumer becomes a liability rather than a shield.
The problem, your unhumble TFN humbly suggests, is a disconnect between how voters and representatives see their jobs. Representatives often see their job as serving as part of a caucus that hews to its norms and leadership strategy.
Voters see representatives as leaders. Not foot soldiers.
Voters don’t want to hear that the courts will have to fix things because Democrats lack the votes. They want to see Democrats winning the political battle and changing the media environment by leading or at least pushing strategies for how to win that aren’t “wait and hope voters hate Republicans enough to elect Democrats.”
Democrats who recognize and bridge that gap will be the party’s next (real) leaders.
The Accuracy/Confirmation Bias of Me
A Hill contact of mine called TFN’s theory that Gillibrand pushed Democrats to support the GOP budget bill “certainly viable.”
And buried in a Politico piece on growing Democratic discontent with Schumer is Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT) hinting on Sunday that something close to my scenario is what happened. Murphy said on NBC that Democrats “need to have a conversation inside the caucus about whether we are willing to stand up to Republicans.” Didn’t say who the “we” are, though! Hmm!
Finally, remember my wildly controversial claim that a shutdown would have been bad for Pres. Donald Trump? Even though Schumer and Gillibrand warned that it would give Trump unfettermaned power?
And remember how the only argument I could muster to show that Trump actually didn’t want a shutdown was the teeny-tiny, mildly inconvenient fact that Trump signed the bill preventing it?
My theory was that Trump doesn’t give a shit about most of this stuff. He just wants to be in charge while keeping his base happy and not churning up negative headlines. In other words, he wants to have his cake and rape it, too.
Well, we got new evidence for this argument when Politico reported yesterday that Trump is planning to push House Republicans to restore $1 billion in funding to Washington, DC, that the GOP spending bill removed. And that Trump doesn’t want to champion that funding publicly.
Without that money, the capitol city would have to slash police funding levels and important other funding. Depriving one of the most Democratic cities in the country of $1 billion in federal taxpayer funding is a MAGA dream. But here’s Trump fighting to reverse the federal funding cut they just won. And not wanting his base to know about it. Hmm!
Two Quickies
Republicans are making sad noises about the solutions of the guy they said can fix everything. Pres. Donald Trump last week ordered an end to a federal program that supports lenders to Main Street businesses in areas that big banks won’t touch with a 10-foot blockchain. The lending program disproportionately helps businesses in urban and rural areas, primarily benefiting those shitty-ass towns you hope not to stop in or die in that have been hollowed out by neoliberal capitalism. Military veterans will also be disproportionately impacted. All of which has congressional Republicans going, uh, wait a minute please. The CEO of one nonprofit that gets those funds said the order “came out of left field.” Which is weird because he’s been donating to right field and you’d think one of his donees might have explained to him that gutting the government means gutting his government funding.
The Trump administration has stopped hundreds of millions of dollars (more) worth of food shipments so people can eat. The Dept. of Agriculture was prepping half a billion dollars in food shipments to food banks. But now food-bank organizers tell Politico that some (all?) of those shipments are getting canceled. This is on top of a previous $1 billion cut to other programs for schools and food banks to buy from local farmers. So, who’ll feed America’s hungry? The Invisible Hand of capitalism! Because if there’s one thing Jesus clearly opposed, it was feeding the hungry.
TCB
Hey, there, brilliant Newsfuckers! I wanted to give you a heads-up that I’m taking a mental-health/me day tomorrow. I’m still jet-lagged/insomnial from taking my son to visit prospective colleges in California, which had to come right before a long-planned visit with friends and another flight on Sunday. So, I’m kinda feeling it and I’m concerned that TFN and/or I am suffering for it, so I wanna take a couple days to recharge for returning my full mental resources to fucking the news for you Newsfuckers.
I won’t blame anyone for begrudging me the day off, but if you look back just a couple weeks or so you may notice that I’ve been doing bonus stories routinely even over the weekends, so I promise in the end I’m still delivering well over the amount of newsfucking I vowed to deliver!
SUPPORTING TFN One reason for taking the day off is I’m seeing a slowdown in financial support for TFN. We’re still growing in free subscribers, but the rate of upgrading to paid has dropped off a bit — which tells me I’m not fucking the news as well as I could with a mental recharge. (And, yes, I’m also worried about another dropoff from skipping tomorrow’s TFN. I hate Catch-22s!)
So, if you’re inclined to support The Fucking News — because it’s a part of your day, or because you appreciate TFN challenging corporate-media narratives — it would be lovely if you’d consider at some point in my me-time between now and Monday upgrading your subscription to paid. We’re still growing, but every new paid subscriber still makes a real difference.
You can also, of course, support TFN with a one-time donation or by picking up some swanky swag at the swanky TFN swag shop!
ELECTIONS
April 1: House of Representatives (Florida-1) — Democrat Gay Valimont vs. Republican Jimmy Patronis.
April 1: House of Representatives (Florida-6) — Democrat Josh Weil vs. Republican Randy Fine.
April 1: Wisconsin state Supreme Court — Democrat Susan Crawford vs. Republican Brad Schimel.
TAKING ACTION Upcoming events/actions:
Today-The Second Coming: Tesla boycott.
March 21-28: Nestlé Blackout (water wars, child labor)
March 28: Economic Blackout #2
April 7-13: Walmart Blackout (‘nuff said)
April 18: Economic Blackout #3
April 21-27: General Mills Blackout
RESOURCES
Mental reassurance that at least lawyers are fighting back on fill-in-the-blank.
CONNECTING Come say hi on Bluesky, Mastodon or Spoutible!
Go get ‘em, kids! And thanks for bearing with me as I wuss out for a long weekend. We’ll resume our regularly scheduled newsfucking on Monday!
TFN creator and writer Jonathan Larsen co-created Up w/ Chris Hayes and wrote for Countdown with Keith Olbermann at MSNBC, helped launch CNN’s Anderson Cooper 360° and Air America Radio, and has also worked at The Daily Show with Jon Stewart and The Young Turks.
It means tossing some poor bastard out a window, even though refenestration doesn’t mean tossing them back in a window.
Disclosure: I was able to pay off mine within about a year of joining a union.
Since both of my kids graduated a long time ago and are out making money hand over fist as it were, I’m going to take a few bucks from the inheritance they don’t need to see you through a day off. TFN is my favorite political information and sometimes delicious gossip source and we want you on your toes.
Hey Jon, never apologize for taking a mental health day. Because of all the shitty news you cover for us, no excuses are needed. Thank you for the news and enjoy your day or days off please.