House panel OKs bills to transfer Education Department duties to other federal agencies

In July, the U.S. House Education and Workforce Committee marked up and passed 10 bills, mostly on party-line votes, that codify the transfer of federal education programs to other agencies in an effort to legally dismantle the Education Department.

Chairman Tim Walberg (R-MI) called the creation of the Education Department, "a politically motivated mistake" that originated as a mission of the National Education Association in 1979. He pointed to decades of declining national test scores among K-12 students and dissatisfaction among college graduates who say the value of their degrees did not hold up in the workforce as evidence of department failure. Ranking Member Robert Scott (D-VA) contended that other federal agencies lack the expertise to implement education programs and that the current interagency agreements are illegal and burdensome.

The package of bills included 10 of the 14 interagency agreements (IAAs) the department has used to transfer programming to other agencies. It does not include the IAAs for the Office for Civil Rights or the Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services. The package now moves to the House floor for full consideration with timing of that vote to occur in the fall.

Fiscal Year 2026 appropriations

Fiscal Year 2026 (FY26) appropriations were finalized across multiple bills enacted between November 2025 and April 2026, including the Department of Education's funding bill on Feb. 3. Federal agencies generally gain access to annual appropriations within 36 days after a bill is signed into law. However, by early summer, the Department of Education had not yet received its full FY26 apportionments, leaving roughly $2 billion for programs on hold. For clarification, an appropriation is a legislative act by Congress that approves a specific amount of money for a government agency or purpose, while an apportionment is the executive branch's subsequent distribution of those funds to an agency to carry out those programs.
Under the Trump administration, the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) has intentionally delayed the funding Congress approved for education, with Title programs, special education, education research and formula grants all showing missing or incomplete apportionments. If OMB does not release FY26 funds by Sept. 30, the funds will technically expire and could be returned to the Treasury Department. That outcome will no doubt produce lawsuits against the executive branch for impounding or withholding congressional appropriations.

In a June congressional hearing, OMB Director Russell Vought argued his team is "trying to assess what funding is being spent on" and whether it aligns with the Trump administration's priorities and executive orders. This action violates Article I of the U.S. Constitution and the Impoundment Control Act, according to recent federal court rulings and legal experts.

For example, the Education Department's Institute of Education Sciences (IES) receives a two-year window to spend its annual budget rather than the standard one year. For FY25, $289 million, more than a third of the budget, remains unspent and at risk of expiring by Sept. 30. That figure includes roughly $135 million for education research and $49 million for education statistics. Roughly 85% of the $77 million designated for special education, approximately $65.5 million, will likewise go unspent if it remains unapportioned by Sept. 30, which seems likely amid a lack of federal notices on grant competitions.

Critics argue that the withholding of funds from the IES can lead to gaps in knowledge, support and progress for students, teachers and schools and that parents and students will pay the ultimate price.

By the end of July, over 100 organizations and numerous members of Congress made inquiries with Education Secretary Linda McMahon requesting the lawful allocation of FY25 and FY26 funding for the Education Department, per congressional direction. The implementation of various operational disruptions is considered by many insiders to be designed to remake the education sector into a more conservative version driven by the current majority party.

Supreme Court ruling

The Supreme Court's ruling in West Virginia v. B.P.J., decided June 30 and consolidated with Little v. Hecox, addressed the contentious question of whether schools may legally determine eligibility for women's and girls' sports based on biological sex without violating either Title IX or the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment. The Court held that neither doctrine prevents states from restricting female school sports teams to biological females. The ruling does not create a nationwide ban or make participation illegal everywhere; instead, it rules that individual states may choose to restrict transgender girls from female school sports teams without violating federal law. Texas has a ban in place, passing legislation in 2023 that requires student-athletes to play on sports teams that correspond to the sex listed on their birth certificate, and that the certificate athletes present must have been issued near the time of birth.

The Court reasoned that biological males generally possess physical advantages that raise fairness and safety concerns in athletic competition. Under the ruling, schools may maintain separate teams where selection is based on competitive skill or where the activity is a contact sport, such as soccer, basketball or football.

Transgender student-athletes are the population directly impacted because they may now be legally excluded from participating where these policies exist. School administrators and athletic directors now have clear legal precedent to enforce their state or school policy. The Court also emphasized that athletics is a distinct context and that its reasoning does not automatically extend to restrooms or other sex-separated spaces.

This article is provided by Van Scoyoc Associates, TCTA's retained lobby firm in Washington, D.C. This article appeared in the Summer 2026 issue of The Classroom Teacher.