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The Department of Education just got a lot closer to the graveyard of failed federal experiments. According to a White House announcement, the Trump administration announced a historic interagency agreement that will move student loan operations from the ED to the Treasury Department, effectively stripping the agency of one of its core functions and proving what conservatives have argued for decades: the federal education bureaucracy is optional at best, harmful at worst.
“I think we’ve been very clear about this last week that this is a multiphase process,” said Nicholas Kent, Undersecretary of Education, in what appears to be a recent statement. The message couldn’t be clearer. Trump campaigned on eliminating this department, signed an executive order to start dismantling it, and now his team is executing the plan with methodical precision. This isn’t talk. This is action.
The agreement transfers operational responsibility for collecting defaulted federal student loan debt to the Treasury, with the department providing “operational support” for returning borrowers to repayment. What does that mean in plain English? The Education Department is being hollowed out from within, its essential functions farmed out to agencies that actually know how to manage money, as outlined in the agreement details.
Andrew Gillen of the Cato Institute called this “the biggest” move yet in the dismantling process, noting that previous interagency agreements were “relatively small” compared to this shift, according to a Cato Institute analysis. When you’re talking about the student loan portfolio that affects millions of Americans, you’re talking about the beating heart of what the Education Department claims to do. And now that heart is being transplanted.
The Secretary of Education has been explicit about the strategy here, with these agreements serving as “proof of concept” designed to show Congress, families, and taxpayers that federal grant aid and student loans can flow without a bloated cabinet-level agency sucking up billions in overhead. The question isn’t whether education matters—it’s whether a federal department headquartered in Washington D.C. is the best way to deliver it.
Trump promised to eliminate this department, and for once, we’re seeing a politician actually follow through. The multiphase process is underway. The student loan move is just the beginning. How many more functions will be transferred before Congress finally admits what everyone already knows? The Department of Education doesn’t educate a single child. It employs bureaucrats, pushes paperwork, and forces states to dance for federal dollars while attaching strings that have nothing to do with reading, writing, and arithmetic.
Conservatives have waited generations for this moment. The left will scream. The teachers unions will file lawsuits. The editorial boards will clutch their pearls. But parents across America are asking a simple question: what exactly has the Department of Education done for my child’s school lately? The honest answer is nothing that couldn’t be done better by states, local communities, and families themselves.
Trump is proving it can be done. One interagency agreement at a time, the Education Department is becoming a shell of its former self. That’s not a tragedy—that’s progress.
Providence watches over the bold.
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