Education department plans to cut half its workforce as Trump vows to wind agency down – US politics live

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Civil servants and supporters of the Department of Education rally in Washington DC.

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Education department to cut half its staff as Trump vows to wind the agency down

The US education department said on Tuesday it would lay off nearly half its staff, a possible precursor to closing alltogether, as government agencies scrambled to meet president Donald Trump’s deadline to submit plans for a second round of mass layoffs.

The terminations are part of the department’s “final mission,” it said in a press release, alluding to Trump’s vow to eliminate the department, which oversees $1.6tn in college loans, enforces civil rights laws in schools and provides federal funding for needy districts.

Asked on Fox News whether the firings would lead to the department’s dismantling, secretary of education Linda McMahon said “yes,” adding that doing so “was the president’s mandate.” The layoffs would leave the department with 2,183 workers, down from 4,133 when Trump took office in January, reports Reuters.

Before announcing the layoffs, the agency ordered offices in the Washington area closed to staff from Tuesday evening through Wednesday, according to an internal notice seen by Reuters.

Civil servants and supporters of the education department rally outside the department in Washington DC, on Tuesday.

An education department spokesperson did not immediately respond to questions by Reuters about the nature of the security issues prompting the closures.
The layoffs are the latest step in Trump’s sweeping effort to downsize the government, led by Elon Musk and his department of government efficiency (Doge).

All US government agencies have been ordered to come up with large-scale layoff plans by Thursday, setting up the next phase of Trump’s cost-cutting campaign. Several agencies have offered employees payments to retire early to fulfil Trump’s demand, reports Reuters.

Affected education department employees will be placed on administrative leave starting on 21 March, the department said.

More on that in a moment. In other developments:

The union representing more than 2,800 department workers said it would fight the “draconian cuts” of the education department. “What is clear from the past weeks of mass firings, chaos, and unchecked unprofessionalism is that this regime has no respect for the thousands of workers who have dedicated their careers to serve their fellow Americans,” said Sheria Smith, president of the American Federation of Government Employees Local 252.
Donald Trump’s trade war kicked into a higher gear at midnight, as 25% tariffs on all imported steel and aluminum were scheduled to begin. There was widespread confusion about whether the tariffs would be delayed, or increased, amid conflicting statements from the president and his chief trade adviser, but the White House said that the previously delayed tariffs would begin, even as the stock marker plunges.
The detained Palestinian activist Mahmoud Khalil, a legal permanent resident, remains in federal custody, despite being charged with no crime. Khalil’s wife said in a statement before a hearing on Wednesday in Manhattan that he was forced into an unmarked car by immigration officers who refused to show a warrant.
The Republican-controlled US House of Representatives passed a stopgap funding bill, which would avert a government shutdown if it also passed the Senate before midnight on Friday.
Ukraine agreed to accept a US proposal for an immediate 30-day ceasefire and to take steps toward restoring a durable peace after Russia’s invasion, according to a joint statement by US and Ukrainian delegations meeting in Saudi Arabia. Russia has not commented.
Canada’s prime minister-designate Mark Carney said he would not lift retaliatory tariffs on American goods until Washington does the same.
At Tuesday’s promotional event for Elon Musk’s line of Tesla electric vehicles at the White House, Trump refused to drive one of the cars, and scoffed at the idea that his predecessor, Joe Biden, had done so at a similar event. There is video of Biden doing so, in August 2021, at an event to promote electric vehicles that Musk reportedly was angry at being excluded from over anti-union policies.

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Education department layoffs met with swift condemnation from Democratic and progressive officials

Abené Clayton

The announcement that the US Department of Education intends to lay off nearly half of its workforce has been met with swift condemnation from Democratic and progressive officials. The Texas representative Greg Casar wrote in a post on X that those in charge were “Stealing from our children to pay for tax cuts for billionaires”.

In a statement, Rosa DeLauro, the ranking member of the House appropriations committee, said:

Presidents Trump and Musk and their billionaire buddies are so detached from how Americans live that they cannot see how ending public education and canceling these contracts kills the American Dream … If kids from working-class families do not have access to schools, how can they build a future?”

Trump campaigned on a promise to close the Department of Education, claiming it had been overtaken by “radicals, zealots and Marxists”. At education secretary Linda McMahon’s confirmation hearing, she acknowledged that only Congress had the power to abolish the agency but said it might be due for cuts and a reorganisation

The 25% global tariffs on steel and aluminium came into effect at midnight ET “with no exceptions or exemptions”.

The European Commission responded almost immediately, saying it would impose counter tariffs on €26bn ($28bn) worth of US goods from next month.

“We deeply regret this measure,” European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen said in a statement about the US tariffs, as Brussels announced it would be “launching a series of countermeasures” in response to the “unjustified trade restrictions”.

Australian deputy prime minister Richard Marles said on Wednesday the lack of exemptions was “really disappointing”, calling tariffs “an act of kind of economic self-harm”. He told radio station 2GB:

We’ll be able to find other markets for our steel and our aluminium and we have been diversifying those markets.”

You can read the full story here and follow the Guardian’s live coverage of the global response to Donald Trump’s new tariffs with my colleagues Julia Kollewe and Kate Lamb over on the business blog:

Lisa O'Carroll

Taoiseach Micheál Martin is meeting Donald Trump at 10am US time for the annual St Patrick’s Day celebrations, a week early this year because of congressional recess.

He plans to tell Trump that the trade imbalance raised by secretary of state Marco Rubio in a phone call with the Irish foreign minister last week masks the complexity of the relationship.

He will point out that among Boeing’s biggest customers are Ryanair and Aercap, the world’s largest aircraft leasing company, which could now be affected by tariffs.

A poll released on Tuesday shows that US president Donald Trump’s approval rating has dropped a few points since he first took office, reports the Hill.

Accoding to the Emerson College Polling survey, 47% of voters approved of Trump’s job performance and 45% disapproved. Those findings are down from a 49% approval and 41% disapproval rating at the beginning of Trump’s second term.

The Hill, reporting on the poll results, wote:

The public’s views of the economy under Trump seem to be a drag on his overall approval rating, with a plurality of 48% saying they don’t approve of Trump’s handling of the economy, while 37% approve.

Voters give Trump his highest ratings for his handling of immigration, with 48% approving and 40% disapproving. His weakest areas are the economy, health care and cryptocurrency, in which he has net approval ratings solidly underwater.”

Even before the layoffs, the education department was among the smallest cabinet-level agencies, reports the Associated Press (AP). Its workforce included 3,100 people in Washington and an additional 1,100 at regional offices across the country, according to a department website.

The department’s workers had faced increasing pressure to quit their jobs since Donald Trump took office, first through a deferred resignation programme and then through a $25,000 buyout offer that expired 3 March.

Jeanne Allen of the Center for Education Reform, which advocates for charter school expansion, said the cuts were important and necessary. Allen said:

Ending incessant federal interference will free up state and local leaders to foster more opportunities to give schools and educators true flexibility and innovation to address the needs of students, wherever they are educated.”

Some advocates were skeptical of the department’s claim that its functions would not be affected by the layoffs, reports the AP. “I don’t see at all how that can be true,” said Roxanne Garza, who was chief of staff in the office of postsecondary education under president Joe Biden.

Much of what the department does, like investigating civil rights complaints and helping families apply for financial aid, is labour intensive, said Garza, who is now director of higher education policy at Education Trust, a research and advocacy organisation. She added:

How those things will not be impacted with far fewer staff … I just don’t see it.”

Education department to cut half its staff as Trump vows to wind the agency down

Before announcing the layoffs, the agency ordered offices in the Washington area closed to staff from Tuesday evening through Wednesday, according to an internal notice seen by Reuters.

Affected education department employees will be placed on administrative leave starting on 21 March, the department said.

More on that in a moment. In other developments:

The union representing more than 2,800 department workers said it would fight the “draconian cuts” of the education department. “What is clear from the past weeks of mass firings, chaos, and unchecked unprofessionalism is that this regime has no respect for the thousands of workers who have dedicated their careers to serve their fellow Americans,” said Sheria Smith, president of the American Federation of Government Employees Local 252.
Donald Trump’s trade war kicked into a higher gear at midnight, as 25% tariffs on all imported steel and aluminum were scheduled to begin. There was widespread confusion about whether the tariffs would be delayed, or increased, amid conflicting statements from the president and his chief trade adviser, but the White House said that the previously delayed tariffs would begin, even as the stock marker plunges.
The detained Palestinian activist Mahmoud Khalil, a legal permanent resident, remains in federal custody, despite being charged with no crime. Khalil’s wife said in a statement before a hearing on Wednesday in Manhattan that he was forced into an unmarked car by immigration officers who refused to show a warrant.
The Republican-controlled US House of Representatives passed a stopgap funding bill, which would avert a government shutdown if it also passed the Senate before midnight on Friday.
Ukraine agreed to accept a US proposal for an immediate 30-day ceasefire and to take steps toward restoring a durable peace after Russia’s invasion, according to a joint statement by US and Ukrainian delegations meeting in Saudi Arabia. Russia has not commented.
Canada’s prime minister-designate Mark Carney said he would not lift retaliatory tariffs on American goods until Washington does the same.
At Tuesday’s promotional event for Elon Musk’s line of Tesla electric vehicles at the White House, Trump refused to drive one of the cars, and scoffed at the idea that his predecessor, Joe Biden, had done so at a similar event. There is video of Biden doing so, in August 2021, at an event to promote electric vehicles that Musk reportedly was angry at being excluded from over anti-union policies.