Department of Education Headcount to Be Cut in Half This Week

An email went out today announcing that the Department of Education would be closed tomorrow. In addition, hundreds of employees will be receiving notices about layoffs.

Department of Education staff will receive “reduction in force” notices Tuesday before nearly half of the department’s workforce is terminated, Fox News Digital has learned. 

Earlier Tuesday, a memo was sent to all Education Department employees informing them that Department of Education offices will be closed Tuesday evening through Wednesday due to “security reasons.” Employees were instructed to leave the offices by 6 p.m. ET Tuesday. 

President Trump has been in office for seven weeks and already the Department of Education is going to be half its previous size once these layoffs take place.

The layoffs mean that the department, which started the year with 4,133 employees, will now have a work force of about half that size after less than two months with President Trump in office. In addition to the 1,315 workers who were fired on Tuesday, 572 employees accepted separation packages offered in recent weeks and 63 probationary workers were terminated last month.

The cuts could portend an additional move by the Trump administration to essentially dismantle the department, as Mr. Trump has said he wants to do, even though it cannot be closed without the approval of Congress.

Back when the Trump administration offered 8 months of severance to federal workers, union leaders started a campaign to convince workers that administration couldn’t be trusted and that no one should accept the offer. Obviously that didn’t work since about 14% of the workforce at this department did accept. Still, you have to wonder how many of the 1,315 people getting layoff notices today wish they had taken that offer when it was made. They can thank the unions for talking them out of it.

There’s lots of talk about Trump signing an executive order sometime soon to shut down the department. The Washington Post has some details.

President Donald Trump is set to issue an executive order as soon as Thursday directing his newly confirmed education secretary to work to close the department she now leads, two people familiar with the situation said.

A draft of the executive order that circulated on Wednesday recognizes that the president does not have the power to shutter the Education Department. It would take an act of Congress and 60 “yes” votes in the Senate, which is unlikely given that Republicans hold only 53 seats.

Rather, the draft calls on Education Secretary Linda McMahon to “take all necessary steps” to facilitate the closure of the department “to the maximum extent appropriate and permitted by law.”

Is there any lower limit on this? At just over 4,100 employees the Education Department was already the smallest government department. In a matter of days the headcount will be down to about 2,000 employees. Can the Secretary drop that number to 200 employees or 20? It wouldn’t technically be abolished and some future president could revive it and staff it up again but it would be effectively dead until Congress gets around to passing a law to eliminate it completely.

Teacher’s union head Randi Weingarten has already had a freakout over this plan but there’s nothing she can do. This is happening.

.@EDSecMcMahon tells @IngrahamAngle that today’s firings are the first step toward a total shutdown of the Education Department.pic.twitter.com/5laPMipgPa

— Josh Caplan (@joshdcaplan) March 11, 2025