Press Releases

Today, Congressional Black Caucus Chair Yvette D. Clarke (NY-09) and members of the Congressional Black Caucus issued the following statement: 

“Despite ongoing calls from the American people for the Trump Administration to keep its promise to lower the costs of living, President Trump and Elon Musk are instead continuing their rampage against career civil servants and institutions that faithfully serve the needs of the American people. 

“In recent days, President Trump ordered the firing of nearly 50 percent of the Department of Education, and has now signed an executive order to further dismantle the agency, which will certainly be challenged in the Courts. 

“In 1954, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Brown v. Board of Education that the 'separate but equal' doctrine established in Plessy v. Ferguson was unconstitutional. In the decades since, the Department of Education has played a vital role in ensuring equal access to education and enforcing desegregation laws. Despite this important and continuing work, challenges in education persist. Today, racial segregation is increasing in our schools. President Trump’s executive actions to further dismantle the Department of Education will make our schools more segregated and unequal. 

“Nearly every family, in every state, in every district, and in every zip code can understand the vital role the Department of Education plays in supporting students and ensuring equal access to high-quality learning opportunities for our children. President Trump’s executive order will lessen the department’s resources and put pressure on already overburdened school systems. Reducing the scale and size of the department will have a disparate impact on the learning opportunities of Blackand minority students, HBCUs, Pell Grant recipients, children with special needs, lower income communities, as well as English as a Second Language students, and limit the government's ability to enforce Title VI and Title IX laws that prohibit discrimination in education programs and activities based on race and gender. 

“When the issue of abolishing the Department of Education came before the House last Congress, 60 Republicans joined Democrats in voting it down. We are calling on Republicans to stand up and demand that President Trump and Elon Musk immediately rescind this executive order which will hurt our nation's public school systems.”