The administration of President Donald Trump is pausing more than $ 6 billion of federal funds appropriate for Congress for school extracurricular programs, student support, teacher training, English language and other educational programs, according to a memorandum of the Department of Education obtained by ABC News.
In a letter to the Congress of the Agency’s Legislation and Congress Affairs Office on Monday afternoon, the DOE said a notification would be sent to certain beneficiaries that alert them that the funds for the next school year would be reviewed on July 1 and that decisions about this academic year “have not yet been taken.”
“The department will not issue notifications for awarding subsidies forcing funds for these programs on July 1 before completing that review,” the Memo is read partly. “The department remains committed to ensuring that taxpayers’ resources are spent according to the president’s priorities and the legal responsibilities of the department.”
Special education financing by mandate through the Education Law (idea) of people with disabilities (idea) has been granted to states on time, according to a Doe source.
But school budgets for the year are generally approved in May or June and are ready to be assigned before July 1, according to experts in educational finance. The abrupt courier of the administration gave few details on how the key programs would be affected in the future and arrives only weeks before many state education agencies return students to the classroom.
A sign marks the location of the headquarters of the Department of Education on June 20, 2025 in Washington, DC
J. David Ake/Getty Images
The national teacher of the year 2024 Missy Testerman, an English instructor as a second language (ESL) in Tennessee, told ABC News any retention of funds will affect schools.
“School budgets are already very tight, so the retention of funds for the required programs, such as those of English students, will certainly place a burden on school systems,” Testerman wrote in a statement to ABC News.
“This will probably mean that systems will face the difficult decision to make budget cuts in other areas, affecting students. In rural systems such as mine, this could mean a reduction in general personnel or the elimination of crucial support for students as programs after school and tutoring,” added Testerman.
The ranking member of the classification of the Education and Labor Force of the House of Representatives, Bobby Scott, D-Virginia, described the measure to retain the appropriate funds a violation of the federal law with potentially devastating consequences.
“The arrest of these critical funds harms students, educators and schools that strive to provide quality public education with the few funds and challenges they face,” Scott wrote in a statement to ABC News.
“School districts with liquidity problems, particularly those in low -income and rural areas, cannot afford this delay and will probably be forced to fire staff or reduce programs and services, while the Budget Office and White House Management Reviews” Las Funds, “said Scott.
State general prosecutors are expected to demand the administration for reviews, according to a source familiar with the matter. Parent groups and education defenders who denounce the decision are also growing demands against the administration, confirmed the source. Defenders accuse the administration of undermining public education in a “cruel betrayal” of students.
“The schools are already dealing with severe shortages of teachers, exhaustion and classrooms of resources little resources, and here comes the federal government that tear the resources of public schools. It is scandalous and inconceivable,” said the president of the National Association of Education, Becky Pringle.
“Educators and parents will not shut up while the students are undervalued, unprecedented and without support,” Pringle wrote in a statement, added: “We will stand up, we will talk and take measures to ensure that each classroom is a place of dignity, opportunity and respect.”
Education providers are playing the alarm on financing that affects millions of students, teachers and families, telling ABC News that they fear that students and low -income families will be left in a link without other care options for their children.
Afterschool Alliance, a non -profit organization, said: “If these funds are not released very soon, we will quickly see more children and young people without supervision and at risk, more academic failures, more hungry children, a more chronic absenteeism, higher abandonment rates, more forced parents of their work and a less ready and successful work of child labor as our child care is dramatically dramatically vestically vest.” “.” “.” “.” “.”
Pause occurs when efforts to dismantle the Department of Education have been blocked by the lower courts. The Supreme Court is also expected to evaluate the dismissal of almost 2,000 employees in the agency.
The DOE sent additional questions to the Office of Management and Budget (WBO).
An OMB spokesman told ABC News that the pause is due to an “ongoing programmatic review” of educational financing, which has not yet made decisions.
Many of the programs “badly used” Government funds to promote a “radical left -wing agenda,” added the OMB spokesman. In some cases, programs supposedly promote the defense of illegal immigration and strange resistance in the arts, according to the spokesman.
