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Floor Speech
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Mr. MARKEY. Mr. President, President Trump and Elon Musk and Secretary of Education Linda McMahon have declared war on public education in the United States, plain and simple. They outlined their anti-student, anti-family, anti-educator agenda in Project 2025. Trump vowed to dismantle the Department of Education last month from the Oval Office.
So instead of nominating a Secretary of Education, he picked and Senate Republicans confirmed an executioner of public education. This administration is attempting to dismantle public education in the United States piece by piece.
Well, Trump and Musk and McMahon are about to learn just how important Federal educational funding is to every community in our country. The Department of Education guards the promise of opportunity for future generations. The Department provides $18 billion a year in funding so that the poorest children in our country can receive the high-quality education to which they are entitled. The Department provides $15 billion a year in funds and oversight to ensure that students with disabilities across our Nation have meaningful access to quality education. It ensures that teachers are trained, that first- generation students have a chance to go to college, that English learners and rural students receive additional support.
Trump and Musk and McMahon might talk about ``efficiency'' and ``dismantling'' the Department of Education, but we know that that is just code for cuts to educational funding for poor children, for disabled children all across our Nation. They don't want to educate; they want to eliminate. They want to loot our country's future which our students depend upon. Children are only 25 percent of our country, but they are 100 percent of our future, and we have to invest in that future, invest in those children.
Ultimately, they want to loot the Department of Education for tens of billions of dollars in order to pay for tax breaks for billionaires and millionaires like Elon Musk. That is what it is all about.
Just last year, the Department of Education provided more than $720 million to support K through 12 education in Massachusetts alone. And every community across our country receives that funding from the Department of Education.
So who do Trump and Musk and McMahon think will pick up the bill for their cruel and callous cuts? Who do they think is going to pick up the tab? We know who is going to pick up the tab. It is going to be poor communities. It is going to be families with disabled children. That is who is going to pick up the tab.
And why are they doing it? To get the money from those poor families and to get the money from those families with kids with disabilities to fund tax breaks for billionaires and millionaires. That is what it is all about. It is cruel. It is callous. But it is all about those cuts to education.
And I am hearing from communities who have no idea how they will keep the lights on if this Federal funding disappears. I am hearing from teachers and educators and families who are terrified that if the teachers are laid off, their students will not receive the services they need. I am hearing from parents of those who need this educational funding. They need to ensure that those programs are there.
But at the end of the day, we know what it is all about. It is to get that funding so that they can then voucherize the public school system, take the money from the public schools and put it over in vouchers. And private companies will begin to benefit from all of that funding, and the remainder will just go to the billionaires for the tax breaks.
And Trump and Musk and McMahon's evil plan to lock the promise of education behind an ivory tower, accessible only to those born into the right circumstances, it is just wrong. It is just plain wrong.
Massachusetts is the birthplace of public education. We are the top performer in the country in math and reading because we invest in students, educators, schools, and communities. We do not believe in draconian cuts or in fueling discrimination in schools. Over the Boston Public Library, the inscription reads:
The Commonwealth requires the education of the people as the safeguard of order and liberty.
While Trump tries to destroy order and liberty in this country, we will fight to protect the education of the people.
You want a fight, President Trump? You want a fight, Secretary McMahon? You have got a fight. You are not going to be allowed to dismantle the Department of Education because, with that, you would be dismantling the hope that every family has that their child may fully realize the American dream.
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