More than 49 million young people attend public schools in the United States, and they have all been thrust into the center of President Donald Trump’s regressive agenda as he moves to use education funding as political leverage. Critics contend his attacks on public education will hurt disabled students, LGBTQ students, students of color, and those from low-income households the most. 

“What’s coming out of Washington—it’s whiplash-inducing and tragic,” says one California middle school and high school history teacher who spoke anonymously for fear of being targeted. “To me, the message [has been] that education is unimportant and the needs of students [are] unimportant.”

The Trump administration’s highest-profile attack on public education came on March 20, 2025, when the president issued an executive order directing Secretary of Education Linda McMahon to begin dismantling the Department of Education. While the president needs congressional approval to abolish the department, to his supporters, this executive order is the next best thing. 

Gutting the Department of Education has been a right-wing aim for decades, as conservative groups such as the Heritage Foundation, which penned Trump’s Project 2025 playbook, claim public education is a seedbed of liberal-left social and political action. Over the last several years, Republican administrators and politicians on the state and local levels have advanced policies or legislation to censor teachers, ban books, and roll back support for marginalized students. 

The adoption of this regressive agenda on the federal level will have even farther-reaching effects. Changes to funding will have an immediate impact on how students nationwide access education—or if they can access it at all. This is because the Department of Education provides crucial funding for public K–12 schools, focusing on districts with the greatest need for support and narrowing gaps between needed resources and state and local revenue.

The department also provides dedicated support to low-income children through Title I funds and to disabled students under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), which is meant to guarantee that disabled kids have equal access to public education.

Trump’s order to dismantle the Department of Education claims that state governments can take over federal responsibilities, but experts warn this could lead to higher-need districts no longer receiving the funding needed to serve students. “Absent the Department of Education to ensure fairness in funding allocation for programs like Title I, it’s unclear how states will handle the disbursement on their own, which could widen inequalities in education,” explains Hilary Wething, an economist at the Economic Policy Institute. Advocates have also begun raising the alarm over protections and funding provided under IDEA being under threat.

The Trump administration’s anti-education agenda will not only strip students of vital resources; experts also warn that dismantling the Department of Education will undermine its ability to perform Congressionally mandated functions vital to addressing inequalities in education. Already, several of the department’s Office for Civil Rights (OCR) regional posts are facing closure. The OCR is meant to enforce civil rights laws at public schools and all colleges and universities that receive federal financial assistance. It does so through investigations and compliance reviews. 

However, as the Trump administration reduces staff and seeks to reorient the OCR, the office will no longer be able to perform these functions. More than 10,000 student complaints related to disability access and sexual and racial harassment have already been placed on hold. 

Rather than investigating allegations of discrimination, the OCR has begun issuing guidance meant to further the Trump administration’s attacks on diversity, equity, and inclusion programs and bring curricula and instructional materials in line with its agenda. One memo, issued on Feb. 14, 2025, gave schools two weeks to cease consideration of race in all aspects of student, academic, and campus life under threat of losing federal funding.

The memo appears to forbid everything from teaching racism in schools to sponsored student groups, such as Black or Latinx student unions. While it is not itself a law, the memo reveals the Trump administration’s warped interpretation of and intention to undermine existing nondiscrimination legislation. 

A Jan. 29, 2025, executive order called for “ending radical indoctrination” in schools and promotion of “patriotic education,” reflecting the administration’s dangerous interpretation of nondiscrimination laws and its desire to whitewash schooling. “The executive order on ending radical indoctrination in K–12 schooling is asking schools to ignore a fulsome, truthful history and to only focus on what’s ‘inspiring,’” says Tricia Gallagher-Geurtsen, quoting the executive order. Gallagher-Geurtsen is a lecturer in critical race and ethnic studies at the University of California, Santa Cruz, and works with primary and secondary school teachers as co-chair of the San Diego Unified School District Ethnic Studies Advisory Committee. 

“The main issue with all of these orders is that the thinking behind them ignores the statistics that show racism exists in every facet of American life,” Gallagher-Geurtsen continues. “If you don’t see race, you can’t see racism, and therefore, it will grow unabated, so the executive orders are woefully ignorant and also incredibly dangerous.”

The Trump administration’s demands are already having a chilling effect on educators. “Teachers have shared with me that they’re frightened of what’s to come,” says Gallagher-Geurtsen. “They’re also really angry that the executive branch is determining what should be taught in schools. Teachers are describing this as censorship and a reflection of white supremacy.”

“It’s a chilling effect to know that I have to look over my shoulder because of the political times we’re living in,” says the California teacher. They also worry that the Trump administration’s efforts to whitewash education could drive some students, particularly students of color, out of school. “When their history education is being curtailed or attempted to be curtailed, I think they’re going to lose a lot of interest in school in general.” 

Research on the benefits of ethnic studies courses shows that students who take such courses tend to engage more in school and are more likely to graduate and enroll in college. The classes have also been shown to improve the attendance and academic performance of students who are at risk of dropping out. “To me, the purpose [of Trump’s attacks] may be to continue the oppression of certain groups and make them not want to fulfill their potential [through] education,” concludes the California teacher.

Additionally, research shows that teaching about race and racism reduces prejudice, while attempts to ignore race in the classroom have the opposite effect. The California teacher believes undermining the positive effects of learning about race and racism is core to the Trump administration’s efforts to dismantle public education. “It’s a systemic approach by the Trump administration to return the country to a time when communities of color had their place, and their place was a lot lower down the academic ladder and the financial ladder, and a time where only a handful of chosen people could contribute [to the nation’s story].”

Many educators are unwilling to bend to the Trump administration in its pursuit of these regressive aims. The American Federation of Teachers, the nation’s second-largest teachers’ labor union, sued the Trump administration over the Feb. 14 memo from the OCR. The suit argues that the memo’s guidance violates the First and Fifth Amendments.

On March 24, a coalition of rights groups and labor unions sued over Trump’s order to shutter the Department of Education. “Working people are not going to stand idly by while this administration destroys public education,” said April Verrett, president of the Service Employees International Union, in a press release announcing the suit.

Plus, in classrooms nationwide, educators are making brave choices to continue recognizing and honoring the diverse needs and backgrounds of their students despite the Oval Office’s posturing. Gallagher-Geurtsen is among those who believe that “the way forward is not through a colorblind, whitewashed education.” Rather, she says, “The way forward is through a reckoning with the past and present of racism. When we understand and lift up our understanding of how racism works, we diminish it, and that happens through looking at race and racism in our origins and our present.”

The California educator says in their classroom, they will continue to uplift the diverse perspectives of their students because they believe “the country is a lot better when everybody has the opportunity to contribute to its story and to live up to [its] promise.”