Trump orders Education Department dismantled. How much money do Tri-City K-12 schools get?
President Trump on Thursday ordered the federal government to shut down the Department of Education, a move that’s anticipated to have sweeping repercussions for the states and territories responsible for the public education of more than 50 million K-12 students.
The executive order calls for Education Secretary Linda McMahon to begin closing the department — a move that can only be done with the approval of Congress, which created the agency — and “return authority over education to the states and local communities, while ensuring the effective and uninterrupted delivery of services, programs and benefits on which Americans rely.”
Pasco, Kennewick and Richland together receive more than $73 million annually in federal funds to benefit public education and student welfare, according to what they reported to the state.
Statewide, the amount of federal funding as a percent of a school district’s total budget averages at about 7%.
That money pays for special education through the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, vocational education, Title I assistance for low-income students, U.S. Department of Agriculture lunch and breakfast programs, summer food programs, the Migrant Education Program and for students struggling with math and English language learning.
Although the details of how these dollars will continue to be dispersed is unclear, the Trump Administration has previously said programs are likely to be folded into other federal departments. Some programs are already based in other agencies, such as meal programs, which are dispersed by the Department of Agriculture.
It’s likely the education department will continue to do some of the “core necessities,” including the dispersal of K-12 poverty and disability funding.
This move comes as Trump and McMahon seek to defund public schools, colleges and universities that espouse or promote “gender ideology” and diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) initiatives.
While the DOE as of last week had yet to pull a single penny for noncompliance from any of Washington’s 295 public school districts serving 1.1 million K-12 students, Trump in his order doubled down on schools to terminate “illegal discrimination” efforts labeled under DEI or gender ideology.
The Department of Education is responsible for sending roughly $60 billion — about 1 in every $7 of public K-12 funding — to states and local school districts each year. During COVID, Congress approved about $200 billion that local school districts could use to respond to the pandemic and remote learning.
Together, paired with state and local investments, public education nationwide funds more than $17,000 per pupil.
“Closing the (DOE) would provide children and their families the opportunity to escape a system that is failing them,” Trump’s order says. “Today, American reading and math scores are near historical lows. This year’s National Assessment of Educational Progress showed that 70% of 8th graders were below proficient in reading, and 72% were below proficient in math. The federal education bureaucracy is not working.”
Chris Reykdal, Washington’s Superintendent of Public Instruction, called Trump’s move an “unprecedented attempt by a president to wield more authority than is granted by the U.S. Constitution or by federal law.”
“What we are seeing in Washington, D.C., is a cruel chaos that has been intentionally designed to promote a school privatization agenda and undo a 60-year commitment to equity and civil rights that lies at the heart of our democratic system. In other states, that agenda has led to greater divides between student groups along socioeconomic and racial lines,” Reykdal said.
Districts feel stuck in ‘legal dilemma’
With Washington laws and school procedures at odds with orders coming down from Trump, some school boards say they feel stuck in a “legal dilemma,” where they risk either the feds or state pulling program funding for noncompliance.
For example, the Mead School Board recently wrote a letter to U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi and McMahon, urging them to swiftly review clashing policies and definitions around pronoun use, gender and allowing transgender athletes on certain rosters.
Reykdal said last week that there’s a simple solution for districts while these executive orders are worked out in the courts: Follow state guidance.
“If there’s a worry grounded in law about losing resources at this point, we’ve told our school districts to lean into state law,” he said a news conference last week. “The prudent course of action right now is to put the ideology aside and focus on defending state law and following state law.”
Reykdal says there is no federal law that defines “gender,” and local districts should continue to follow longstanding nondiscrimination laws.
Federal layoffs could have immediate “responsiveness” risks to civil rights safeguards, disability protections and financial aid processes, Reykdal warns.
