Overview

• A conservative-majority Supreme Court temporarily cleared the way for the Education Department to resume cutting nearly half of its workforce.
• President Trump’s March decree tasks Secretary Linda McMahon with phasing out the department and slashing its staffing by roughly 50%.
• In May, a Boston federal judge paused the plan and ordered hundreds of employees reinstated after lawsuits from twenty states and teacher unions.
• Justice Sonia Sotomayor dissented, calling the decision “indéfendable” and warning against judicial facilitation of executive illegality.
• Fully dismantling the department still requires a new Senate law with 60 votes, a threshold beyond the current 53-seat Republican majority.