(Photo: Shauneen Miranda/States Newsroom)
A group of Democratic attorneys general filed a lawsuit on Thursday to block the dismissal of nearly half of the Department of Education’s workforce by the Trump administration this week.
Nevada Attorney General Aaron Ford joined 20 other Democratic Attorneys General to block the terminations, calling them “illegal” and “dangerously reckless.”
The Department of Education on Tuesday announced nearly half of its 4,100-employee workforce would be fired, the latest move toward Donald Trump’s goal of dismantling the department entirely.
Some of the department’s core functions include administering college financial aid, enforcing civil rights laws at schools, providing federal funding for low-income school districts and guaranteeing a free public education for children with disabilities.
The lawsuit alleges the layoffs are so severe the department “can no longer function, and cannot comply with its statutory requirements.”
Cuts to the department will result in the loss or delay of federal money for public schools in Nevada, especially for students from low-income families and students with disabilities, Ford said in a press release.
“Gutting the Department of Education isn’t just unlawful; it’s an attack on Nevada’s students, especially those who rely on special education services or come from low-income families. You can’t take a hatchet to half the workforce and expect the department to function,” Ford said.
“You can’t rip away resources and expect kids to succeed. And you certainly can’t do those things without following the law. This plan is unconstitutional. It’s illegal. It’s dangerously reckless. And I will do everything in my power to stop it,” Ford continued.
Only Congress has the authority to close a cabinet-level agency or dismantle its core function, the lawsuit says. Any moves to single-handedly dismantle the department are unconstitutional and illegal because funding for the department is authorized by Congress.
The president “can neither outright abolish an agency nor incapacitate it by cutting away the personnel required to implement the agency’s statutorily-mandated duties”, the lawsuit argues.
The sweeping cuts are part of a government-wide effort by Trump and Tesla CEO Elon Musk to reduce the federal workforce in an effort to slash government spending and reduce what they see as waste.
Trump has targeted the Education Department specifically in the spending cuts initiative, repeatedly pledging to shutter the 45-year-old agency in his quest to move education “back to the states.”
The lawsuit cites an interview with the Education Secretary Linda McMahon on Fox News, where she said the president’s directive to her was to shut down the department, and the cuts were the “first step of eliminating what I think is bureaucratic bloat.”
The other state attorneys general joining the lawsuit represent: Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, New York, New Jersey, Oregon, Rhode Island, Washington, Wisconsin, Vermont and the District of Columbia.