Judging from the rhetoric emanating from Washington, D.C., the U.S. Department of Education appears to be living on borrowed time. President Donald Trump has said that he wants to scale it down, then work with Congress to abolish it. His nominee for education secretary, Linda McMahon, echoed that intention in her confirmation hearing.
In the Trump administration’s push to reduce the size of the federal government, the Education Department looks like an easy target. The smallest Cabinet agency, with around 4,000 employees, it is sometimes controversial but rarely a centerpiece in D.C. politics and policy, partly because education funding and policy are overwhelmingly state and local issues. In recent years, however, the department’s total dollar impact has grown because of its student debt portfolio, now totaling around $1.6 trillion.
Democrats view the possibility of eliminating the Education Department as…
