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A key part of Trump's agenda is the dismantling of failed federal institutions like the Department of Education, something conservatives say is long overdue. The Department has recently become just another example of redundant government waste and a failure.
Despite trillions of dollars being spent on the department since its creation in 1979, Corey DeAngelis with the American Culture Project says it hasn't even achieved its basic goals. He said, "It was created to close achievement gaps and improve education nationwide, but it hasn't done that. Achievement gaps in some places have gotten worse."
He went on to say that everyone would be better off if education was simply put back into the complete control of the various state-level education departments. He said, "You'd have more money for education to spend in the classroom, more local control, because you wouldn't have as much money wasted on useless bureaucrats."
DeAngelis says that at this point, the Department of Education does more for teachers' unions and bureaucrats than it does for actual students.
Of course, an act of Congress would be required to formally end the department forever, so how far can Trump actually go towards destroying the department on his own? DeAngelis says Education Secretary Linda McMahon has already made quite a bit of progress in that regard.
He said, "My hope is that Linda McMahon can get in there and give it death by a thousand cuts, and sort of kill it from the inside, which is something she's already started to do with massive layoffs." He also pointed out that McMahon has already fired about half of the department's staff.