Another day, another headline-grabbing victory by President Trump in the U.S. Supreme Court. A string of injunctions issued against him by liberal district court judges, as typically affirmed by Democrat-majority appellate panels, has resulted in a string of rulings in favor of Trump by a 6-3 majority at the SCOTUS.
Each time there has been a strongly worded dissent by one of the three liberal justices on the Court, usually Justice Sotomayor or Jackson, as joined by colleagues in their voting bloc. The long-winded dissents are not making any difference in the outcome.
Trump’s attorney in the High Court is the Missourian John Sauer, who has set a record for quickly and repeatedly prevailing there. Sauer wrote in his emergency application in this case of Linda McMahon v. New York, “For the second time in three months, the same district court has thwarted the Executive Branch’s authority to manage the Department of Education despite lacking jurisdiction to second-guess the Executive’s internal management decisions.”
The Court then held in Sauer’s favor. It authorized Trump to proceed with his firing of 1,378 employees at the Education Department, which will gut this harmful federal agency as Trump promised. Within two hours of this unsigned decision by the Court, agency employees received the equivalent of pink slips.
“The Federal Government has been running our Education System into the ground, but we are going to turn it all around by giving the Power back to the PEOPLE,” Trump posted on Truth Social, while thanking the Supreme Court for his latest win.
President Jimmy Carter established the Education Department nearly 50 years ago, and conservatives led by Phyllis Schlafly have been trying to shut it down ever since. Local school boards and state legislators need the flexibility to adopt standards and curricula that are best for students, based on input from families and accountability in local elections.
There have been 24 years of Republican presidents since Carter, during which the Education Department has continued to interfere with local control over schools. Every federal initiative for education, even those by Republican presidents, has been a failure, as reading and math test scores have plummeted.
In recent years, the Department of Education has become a way for liberals to require schools to embrace transgender ideology and woke indoctrination. For decades, this federal agency and liberal judges have imposed a misinterpretation of Title IX to require colleges to cancel men’s sports teams to satisfy senseless numeric quotas relative to women’s sports, and to deny men due process when subjected to accusations by women.
The disbanding of the Education Department began with an executive order issued by Trump on March 20, 2025. He correctly and boldly explained that “closing the Department of Education would provide children and their families the opportunity to escape a system that is failing them.”
“Today, American reading and math scores are near historical lows. This year’s National Assessment of Educational Progress showed that 70 percent of 8th graders were below proficient in reading, and 72 percent were below proficient in math. The Federal education bureaucracy is not working,” Trump added.
Supreme Court Justice Sotomayor complained in her lengthy dissent on Monday that the Court’s decision in favor of Trump “hands the Executive the power to repeal statutes by firing all those necessary to carry them out.” However, she omitted that the election of Trump last November gave him the mandate to do this, and that, until 1979, education was under local control.
Justice Sotomayor quoted from Trump’s campaign last year during which he promised (as slightly edited by the Court) to “close up the Department of Education” and “send all education and education work ... back to the states” “early in the administration.” Promises made, promises kept.
Some staff at these agencies are needed to reverse the weaponization of the federal government by liberals, but that is already being accomplished. Linda McMahon, as Trump’s Education Secretary, has declared that the “final mission” is to return authority to the states.
Last week, the Supreme Court also held in favor of Trump on a different challenge to his authority to downsize the federal workforce at other agencies. Combined with Monday’s ruling, Trump can move full steam ahead on the D.O.G.E. mass firing goals that began with Elon Musk.
The Department of Justice should rank high on the list of federal agencies where thousands of employees should be laid off or fired. To this day, prosecutions continue by the DOJ that never should have been in federal court.
Fortunately, Attorney General Pam Bondi has recently dismissed one of those prosecutions, against a Utah physician who helped families avoid the Covid vaccine that they did not want. Bondi has also recently fired DOJ attorneys in a refreshing attempt to clean house.
John and Andy Schlafly are sons of Phyllis Schlafly (1924-2016) and lead the continuing Phyllis Schlafly Eagles organization with writing and policy work.