Trump wants to dismantle the Education Department. What would that mean?
Trump signed an executive order in March saying he would take 'all lawful steps' to close the Education Department, although the White House acknowledged at the time that only Congress can do so. Trump has claimed that the current education system is 'failing' children and their families.
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The Hill
24 minutes ago
- The Hill
Senate tees up debate on package to claw back public broadcasting, foreign aid funds
Vice President Vance on Tuesday night broke a tie to allow the Senate to begin debate on a bill to claw back billions of dollars in funding previously authorized by Congress for foreign aid and public broadcasting. The chamber voted 50-50 to begin debate on the package of cuts. Sens. Lisa Murkowski (Alaska), Susan Collins (Maine) and Mitch McConnell (Ky.) voted against the motion. The vote came shortly after the three also voted against discharging the rescissions package from the Appropriations Committee, forcing Vance to break that tie as well. Senators expect a marathon voting session on potential changes to the bill in the day ahead as Senate leaders look to pass the measure ahead of a looming Friday deadline. The bill, which passed the House last month, calls for about $8 billion in cuts to the United States Agency for International Development and foreign aid, and more than $1 billion in cuts to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB). Murkowski and Collins both expressed concerns about the cuts to public broadcasting and the way the rescissions package had been presented to Congress. 'I don't want us to go from one reconciliation bill to a rescissions package to another rescissions package to a reconciliation package to a continuing resolution. We're lawmakers. We should be legislating,' Murkowski said on the Senate floor earlier Tuesday. Collins, in a statement, said 'I recognize the need to reduce excessive spending and I have supported rescissions in our appropriations bills many times, including the 70 rescissions that were included in the year-long funding bill that we are currently operating under. But to carry out our Constitutional responsibility, we should know exactly what programs are affected and the consequences of rescissions.' The vote comes after the Trump administration worked with Republicans on potential changes to the package after some expressed concerns about the scope of cuts. White House budget chief Russell Vought told reporters on Tuesday that the administration would be 'fine with' an amendment to the package that shields the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) from proposed cuts in the package. Sen. Mike Rounds (R-S.D.), who had previously held off from backing the package due to concerns about how tribal stations would fare proposed public media cuts, also said he'd support the plan after a deal with the administration. Rounds said Tuesday that he worked with OMB on a deal that would redirect some funding approved under the Biden administration as part of the Inflation Reduction Act. 'We have an agreement with OMB to resource the funds from other already allocated funding through what had been [former President] Biden's Green New Deal program, and we'll take that money and we'll reallocate it back into the tribes to take care of these radio stations that have been granted this money for the next two years,' Rounds told reporters Tuesday. While the CPB provides some funding to NPR and PBS, which have come under heavy GOP scrutiny as the party has leveled allegations of bias against the media organizations, Republicans in both chambers have raised concerns the cuts could have a disproportionate effect on rural and tribal stations. Top Republicans are ramping up work to lock down support for Trump's package to claw back previously congressionally approved funds. The party can afford to lose three votes in the Senate. Congress has until July 18 to pass the legislation under the special rescissions process initiated by the White House last month that allows the Senate to approve the funding cuts with a simple majority vote, bypassing expected Democratic opposition.
USA Today
25 minutes ago
- USA Today
Pentagon pulls 2,000 National Guard members from Los Angeles in immigration rollback
WASHINGTON ― The Trump administration is pulling half of the California National Guard members it deployed to Los Angeles in a major rollback of President Donald Trump's militarized response to protests in Southern California over immigration arrests and raids. 'Thanks to our troops who stepped up to answer the call, the lawlessness in Los Angeles is subsiding," Chief Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell said in a July 15 statement. "As such, the Secretary has ordered the release of 2,000 California National Guardsmen (79th IBCT) from the federal protection mission." Trump deployed 4,000 California National Guardsmen on June 7 to respond to protests that racked the southern part of the state after he stepped up immigration raids and arrests, targeting farms, restaurants, and hardware stores across the Los Angeles area. He also ordered 700 Marines to the city that were tasked with guarding federal property. The deployment was decried by the state's Democratic lawmakers, who have called an overreach of presidential authority and accused Trump of inciting violence. Trump has claimed that the "Los Angeles would be burning right now" if not for the military presence. California Gov. Gavin Newsom, a Democrat who sued the Trump administration over the guard's deployment, called for Trump to release the remaining National Guard members from Los Angeles now that half have been pulled. 'While nearly 2,000 of them are starting to demobilize, the remaining guards members continue without a mission, without direction and without any hopes of returning to help their communities,' Newsom said in a statement Tuesday. We call on Trump and the Department of Defense to end this theater and send everyone home now.' Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass claimed victory after Trump's withdrawal of guardsmen. 'This happened because the people of Los Angeles stood united and stood strong," Bass said in a statement. "We organized peaceful protests, we came together at rallies, we took the Trump administration to court ‒ all of this led to today's retreat." Bass added: "We will not stop making our voices heard until this ends, not just here in LA, but throughout our country.' One National Guard brigade is being withdrawn from Los Angeles, according to a Defense official who was not authorized to speak publicly. About one brigade, with several thousand soldiers, remains. An appeals court ruled in June that Trump could keep control over the National Guard troops. Trump, upon his return Tuesday night to the White House after traveling to Pittsburgh, did not respond to a shouted question from a reporter about his decision to pull the guardsmen from Los Angeles.
Wall Street Journal
28 minutes ago
- Wall Street Journal
After a Mayor's Mysterious Death, a Land Dispute Divides Republicans in Tennessee
MANCHESTER, Tenn.—Smack dab between the swelling urban centers of Nashville, Chattanooga, and Huntsville, Ala., rural Coffee County was poised to become Tennessee's next boomtown, with subdivisions rapidly replacing farmland. But when the county's pro-growth mayor, Judd Matheny, died under unusual circumstances last year, it unleashed a development battle with a Southern Gothic twist that has split this deeply red area over the fundamental question of what it means to be conservative.
