By ANNIE MA
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Training Division is handing over extra of its packages and grants to different federal companies, asserting a pair of recent agreements Monday that transfer the Trump administration nearer to its aim of shutting down the division.
Beneath one interagency settlement, the Well being and Human Providers Division will take over grant packages that ship tens of millions of {dollars} to varsities for security and group engagement efforts. One other requires the State Division to take over a portal that tracks overseas items to universities.
“As we proceed to interrupt up the federal training paperwork and return training to the states, our new partnerships with the State Division and HHS symbolize a sensible step towards better effectivity, stronger coordination, and significant enchancment,” Training Secretary Linda McMahon mentioned in an announcement.
Republican President Donald Trump and McMahon have acknowledged solely Congress has authority to shut the Training Division totally, however each have advised its core features could possibly be parceled out to completely different federal companies.
The settlement with HHS strikes a small subset of grants to the well being company with out touching the Training Division’s particular training work. McMahon has lengthy advised that particular education schemes needs to be moved to HHS too, and as just lately as December she instructed advocates that she nonetheless intends to maneuver these packages out of the division.
But the problem has proved to be politically risky for McMahon, who has been grilled over her plans for particular training even by some in her occasion. The most recent agreements make no point out of the division’s Workplace of Particular Training and Rehabilitative Providers, which manages billions of {dollars} in grants and oversees state compliance with the People with Disabilities Training Act.
Final 12 months, the division signed seven comparable agreements, transferring a sweeping slate of labor to the Division of Labor and the Inside Division, along with the State Division and HHS. These agreements coated billions in federal funding streams that went to packages like Title I, which helps low-income college students.
The union representing division employees mentioned the most recent agreements would shift work to companies with no instructional experience.
“This isn’t effectivity — Secretary McMahon is creating confusion for faculties and schools, eroding public belief, and harming college students and households,” AFGE Native 252 President Rachel Gittleman mentioned in an announcement.
“That is an insult to the tens of tens of millions of scholars who depend on the Division to safeguard entry to high quality training and to the taxpayers who depend upon federal oversight to stop waste.”
Democratic Sen. Patty Murray of Washington state mentioned the agreements would damage college students and households.
“These unlawful agreements aren’t simply creating pointless new paperwork that burdens our already-overworked academics and faculties; they’re actively jeopardizing sources and help that college students and households depend on and are entitled to underneath the regulation,” Murray mentioned.
Beneath the brand new agreements, the State Division will take an elevated position in knowledge assortment, reporting and enforcement of Part 117, which requires schools and universities to reveal items of $250,000 or extra annually.
The settlement with HHS will ship six packages to the Administration for Youngsters and Households, which can take over grant competitions and technical help for these grants.
However the way forward for these packages is already unsure. In its 2026 price range request, the Trump administration mentioned it wished to zero out the price range of 5 of the six packages it’s transferring to HHS. And in December, some recipients of the Promise Neighborhoods and Full-Service Group Colleges grants, which pay for tutorial and afterschool enrichment alternatives for college students, have been notified that their funding wouldn’t proceed in 2026, bringing a lot of their work to a sudden halt.
Related Press author Collin Binkley contributed to this report.
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