The Department of Education (DOED) is pulling the plug on the use of taxpayer dollars to fund “divisive” and “inappropriate” training programs for educators, announcing hundreds of millions in cuts as the Trump administration cleans house on “wasteful” spending within the federal government.
On Monday, the DOED announced the cancelation of $600 million dollars in grants funding programs that teach educators “divisive ideologies” such as diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) and the “instruction on White privilege and White supremacy.”
The latest spending cut comes just days after the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), led by Elon Musk to cut government spending, announced the slashing of over $370 million in DEI training programs from the Education Department.
The grants that were terminated included funding for training programs “requiring practitioners to take personal and institutional responsibility for systemic inequities (e.g., racism) and critically reassess their own practices,” according to the DOED.
DOGE PUTS DEI ON CHOPPING BLOCK WITH TERMINATION OF OVER $370M IN EDUCATION DEPARTMENT GRANTS
The Department of Education terminated $600 million in DEI funding. (Getty Images)
Also slashed in the cost-cutting sweep was funding to one program that provided “spaces for critical reflection to help educators confront biases and have transformative conversations about equity,” and another that worked on “building historical and sociopolitical understandings of race and racism to interrupt racial marginalization and oppression of students in planning, instruction, relationship building, discipline and assessment.”
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“Less money on DEI nonsense means more money to make sure teachers know how to teach students to read! #MakeAmericaLiterateAgain,” Moms for Liberty co-founder Tiffany Justice said in a post on X.
The move also received a thumbs up from Rep. Virginia Foxx, R-N.C., chairwoman of the House Committee on Education and the Workforce, who expressed her support on social media.
The Department of Education building. (iStock)
According to the DOED, many of the grants also included teacher and staff recruiting strategies that were “implicitly and explicitly based on race.”
“The Department of Education has canceled $600 million in ‘teacher training grants,’ which do little more than promote left-wing race and gender ideologies,” Chris Rufo, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute, said of the announcement. “It’s time to shut it all down.”
Elon Musk speaks during an event in the Oval Office with President Donald Trump at the White House on Tuesday, Feb. 11, 2025 in Washington, D.C. (AP Images)
President Donald Trump’s administration has made axing DEI programs in education a focal point of their efforts to reform the department, ordering all 50 state education departments last week to remove DEI policies within 14 days or risk losing federal funding.
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The president has signaled his intention to eventually abolish the department during his term to allow individual states to make decisions about their own education departments.
