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signed an executive order to begin dismantling the US Department of Education, seeking to fulfill decades of conservative ambition to get rid of the agency but raising new questions for public schools and parents. Republican strategist and pollster Kristen Soltis Anderson joins CNN’s Kasie Hunt to discuss.

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CNN  — 

President Donald Trump kicked off the process of dismantling the Department of Education by signing an executive order on Thursday.

The move aims to fulfill a longstanding campaign promise and shift more power over education to the states. While the president cannot completely shut down the agency without approval from Congress, the department announced earlier this month that nearly half its staff would leave through layoffs and voluntary buyouts.

It remains to be seen what will happen to the agency’s programs and functions, and legal challenges to Trump’s executive order are likely.

Federal funding for students with disabilities, who fall under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, along with Title I funding for low-income schools and federal student loan payments, will not be changed by the order, a senior administration official said. However, the order bans programs or activities receiving agency funds from advancing diversity, equity and inclusion or gender ideology.

Supporters of the order have said that education oversight should be returned to the states and parents, while opponents argue that that the move will harm children and their ability to learn.

Here’s what to know about the Trump administration’s effort to dismantle the Department of Education:

Low-income, rural and disabled students could be impacted

The Department of Education provides tens of billions of dollars in funding to support millions of students in low-income and rural areas and those with disabilities – and advocates are concerned about what the agency’s shuttering could mean for them.

The agency funnels more than $18 billion in supplemental funding annually to local school districts to provide extra academic support to schools with high rates of poverty. Title I grants serve about 26 million low-income students.

The dismantling of the department, along with the loss of many of its staffers, raises concerns about ensuring that states and districts will use the federal funds in the best ways to lead to positive outcomes for students, said Weade James, senior director for K-12 education policy at the left-leaning Center for American Progress. For instance, she questioned whether states will track students’ progress.

Also, rural and smaller school districts rely on the Department of Education for technical assistance and for the implementation of the Title I grants and other programs, she noted.

“It’s very important that we continue to question how these cuts are going to impact students because indeed they are,” James said. “There’s going to be a loss of expertise and a loss of data collection, oversight and accountability.”

The Department of Education also sets the parameters around accommodations for disabled students, ensuring that they have the right to a free and appropriate public education. The agency helps fund schools for the deaf and blind in the US and oversees the Rehabilitation Services Administration, which provides services that aim to help Americans with disabilities live more independently and land jobs. The department provides more than $15 billion annually to help serve 7.4 million students through the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, known as IDEA.

What happens to these functions remains to be seen, but Project 2025, a sweeping plan to overhaul the federal government written by several people in Trump’s orbit, called for the functions to be shifted to the Department of Health and Human Services, which is not as knowledgeable about the programs, said Mia Ives-Rublee, senior director for the Disability Justice Initiative at the Center for American Progress. That could make it much more difficult for students with disabilities to get the services they need, she said.

“What we do know is we’re going to see a radical change in the way we provide or don’t provide services to disabled students,” she said.

Questions remain around management of federal student loans

The Department of Education has struggled to find a viable alternative agency to manage its massive student debt portfolio, according to two sources involved in the discussions. The loan portfolio totals a staggering $1.8 trillion in debt, with an estimated 40% of loans past due, the sources said, up from what CNN has previously reported based on publicly available information.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt announced ahead of the executive order’s signing on Thursday that certain “critical functions” like student loans and administering grants to at-risk students would remain with the Department of Education, but Trump later said those functions would be redistributed to other agencies.

The discrepancy could set up a challenge for Education Secretary Linda McMahon, who is required by law to carry out some of the department’s congressionally mandated functions, including administering loans and providing grants for schools in high-poverty areas.

The president had previously suggested that the portfolio – which is larger than all but three US banks – would be transferred to the Treasury Department or Small Business Administration, though those plans have not taken shape.

“Treasury doesn’t want it,” according to one of the sources involved in the discussions, who also told CNN no conversations about moving it to the Small Business Administration had advanced.

The Department of Education does not have control over the curriculum in schools.

In creating the Department of Education, Congress said:

“No provision of a program administered by the Secretary or by any other officer of the Department shall be construed to authorize the Secretary or any such officer to exercise any direction, supervision, or control over the curriculum, program of instruction, administration, or personnel of any educational institution, school, or school system, over any accrediting agency or association, or over the selection or content of library resources, textbooks, or other instructional materials by any educational institution or school system, except to the extent authorized by law.”

Responsibility for curriculum falls on states and localities, so the executive order would not affect students’ curriculum directly.

Through a combination of layoffs and voluntary “buyouts,” the Department of Education has announced plans to nearly halve its workforce since Trump took office.

One of the offices hit hardest by the job cuts, the Office for Civil Rights, works to protect students by holding schools and colleges that receive federal funds accountable for combating antisemitism, islamophobia, racism and discrimination against students with disabilities.

The Trump administration is shuttering seven of the office’s 12 regional offices and laying off nearly half of its staff

What happens to the office is still uncertain. But employees within the office have told CNN they are extremely concerned about their ability to process the claims effectively with half of the staff.

“This will completely halt the vast majority of cases that we can take in, evaluate and investigate,” said one employee at OCR, who asked to remain anonymous out of fear of retribution.

CNN’s Jeff Zeleny contributed to this story.

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Canadians Turn on Tesla, and It Becomes Physical

More than 80 Teslas were damaged in Hamilton, Ontario, the police said, amid other acts of vandalism against the company owned by Elon Musk.

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Published March 20, 2025Updated March 21, 2025, 12:34 a.m. ET

Elon Musk has said that “Canada is not a real country,” just one of his social media jabs at the U.S. neighbor.

But people in Canada have done real damage to the vehicles and dealerships belonging to his electric car company, Tesla, according to the police.

More than 80 Teslas had their tires punctured and bodies scratched at a lot in Hamilton, Ontario, the police said on Thursday. Several acts of vandalism against Tesla property have also been committed in the United States.

Hamilton, west of Toronto, is the heart of Canada’s steel manufacturing industry and a battlefront in the country’s trade war with the United States.

President Trump has imposed tariffs on steel and other Canadian products and Canada has responded by applying levies to $20.5 billion worth of exports from the United States.

Mr. Trump has also claimed that Canada has long “ripped off” the United States and wants to make it the 51st state.

Canadians have responded with a grass-roots protest, changing how they shop, travel and think about their relationship with the United States, the country’s closest ally and trading partner. Even the cherished Canadian hockey legend Wayne Gretzky is not immune from the fury for his silence on actions taken by Mr. Trump, who is a friend.

Canadian provincial leaders have introduced their own measures to retaliate against the tariffs, including removing American alcohol products from liquor stores and barring U.S. companies from applying for procurement contracts.

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Canadians have also directed their ire at Mr. Musk, the billionaire businessman, who is helping lead Mr. Trump’s effort to reshape the federal government.

In Montreal, two members of a climate advocacy group called Last Generation Canada doused the exterior of a Tesla dealership in pink spray paint on Wednesday, according to a statement issued by the group.

The group said it had committed the act because it believed that Mr. Musk was “destroying democracies and spreading climate denial.”

The two members involved in the episode were later arrested, the authorities said.

Concerns about vandalism and protests led organizers of a recent auto show in Vancouver to exclude Tesla from the event.

“This decision will ensure all attendees can be solely focused on enjoying the many positive elements of the event,” Eric Nicholl, the show’s executive director, said in a statement.

Tesla dealerships in other Canadian cities, including Ottawa, the capital, have attracted angry protesters carrying signs.

Ontario, Canada’s most populous province, canceled a contract worth 100 million Canadian dollars, about $70 million, with Starlink, the satellite internet company owned by Mr. Musk.

Last month, thousands of Canadians called on the government to revoke Mr. Musk’s Canadian citizenship and passport in a petition that now has about 376,000 signatures.

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Vjosa Isai is a reporter and researcher for The Times based in Toronto, where she covers news from across Canada. More about Vjosa Isai

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Donald Trump signed an executive order on Thursday that instructs the US education secretary, Linda McMahon, to start dismantling the education department, seemingly attempting to circumvent the need to obtain congressional approval to formally close a federal department.

The administration may eventually pursue an effort to get Congress to shut down the agency, Trump said at a signing ceremony at the White House on Thursday, because its budget had more than doubled in size in recent years but national test scores had not improved.

The federal government does not mandate curriculum in schools; that has been the responsibility of state and local governments, which provide 90% of the funding to schools. Nevertheless, at the White House, Trump repeated his campaign promise to “send education back to the states”.

Democrats on Capitol Hill denounced the executive order and warned it could leave in jeopardy millions of low-income families, who rely on federal funding in schools.

Hakeem Jeffries, the US House minority leader, said in a statement: “Shutting down the Department of Education will harm millions of children in our nation’s public schools, their families and hardworking teachers. Class sizes will soar, educators will be fired, special education programs will be cut and college will get even more expensive.”

Here are the key US politics story from Thursday:

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Trump orders dismantling of education department

The executive order targeting the education department, which has been expected for weeks, directed McMahon to take all necessary steps to shut down key functionalities.

Trump added at the signing ceremony that he hoped McMahon would be the last education secretary.

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US rejects Mexico’s request for water

The United States has for the first time refused a request by Mexico for water, alleging shortfalls in sharing by its southern neighbor.

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Pam Bondi to charge Tesla damage suspects with ‘domestic terrorism’

The US attorney general announced charges against three people she accused of “violent destruction of Tesla properties”, amid protests and controversy over Tesla owner Elon Musk’s role in slashing US government staffing and budgets under Donald Trump.

In a statement on Thursday, Pam Bondi said: “The days of committing crimes without consequence have ended. Let this be a warning: if you join this wave of domestic terrorism against Tesla properties, the Department of Justice will put you behind bars.”

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Revolt looms over defense shake-up

Republicans on Capitol Hill are threatening a revolt against a defense shake-up reportedly planned by the Trump administration that could see the US relinquish its command of Nato forces in Europe.

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Musk’s daughter says rally gesture ‘definitely a Nazi salute’

Vivian Jenna Wilson, Elon Musk’s eldest child, has spoken out publicly about her father, saying that Musk “definitely [did] a Nazi salute” at two rallies in January and that he is part of a White House that’s “cartoonishly evil”.

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Judge demands answers from White House on deportation flights to El Salvador

A federal judge instructed the Trump administration on Thursday to explain why its failure to turn around flights carrying deportees to El Salvador did not violate his court order in a growing showdown between the judicial and executive branches.

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‘Deported because of his tattoos’: has the US targeted Venezuelans for their body art?

The US claims that tattoos prove membership of the Tren de Aragua gang but relatives instead describe tributes to God, family and Real Madrid.

Tom Phillips and Clavel Rangel with this in-depth feature about Franco José Caraballo Tiapa, one of scores shipped to El Salvador by the Trump administration last weekend as part of his hard-line immigration crackdown.

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Judge bars Trump administration from deporting Indian academic over political views

A US district judge has barred Donald Trump’s administration from deporting an Indian academic from Georgetown University after the Department of Homeland Security accused him of having ties to Hamas.

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