Donald Trump’s standard 2024 election speech includes a vow that’s sure to draw cheers from the far right: “I won’t give a penny to any school that requires vaccinations.” While Trump, a Republican, hasn’t provided details about how the pledge would work, it raises the possibility that a second Trump administration would deny federal funding to schools that try to stop the spread of polio.
But in fact, this is not the only area in which the former president has said he would reject federal funding for education.
President Trump said last year that he planned to shut down the Department of Education if he was awarded a second term, mirroring a key element of his Project 2025 plan — a radical step he hesitated to take while in the White House. The presumptive Republican nominee has repeated the promise many times since then.
But as part of that same pitch, Trump has also touted proposals to cut federal investment in education. Republicans who spoke to the Faith and Freedom Coalition over the weekend said twice that they were willing to cut federal education spending in half, even if it meant worsening finances for some states.
Hours later, the former president made the same allegations at a rally in Philadelphia, where he also spoke. The Washington Examiner reported:
“It could be reduced [spending on] “I’m going to cut the cost of education in half and some states will have a much higher quality education,” Trump said. “We’re going to have the best education in the world.” But, he added, “it’s not going to work for some of us.”
The Republican candidate added that when it comes to education and student achievement “we’re at the bottom of every list”, prompting Trump to ask “What have you got to lose?”
There are a ton of problems with this pitch, starting with the fact that American students aren’t actually “at the bottom of every list.” It would be nice if Trump explained in more detail why he thinks some places “can get a much higher quality education” with fewer resources.
Incidentally, Trump could identify states he expects will “not fare well” under his vision for investing in education.
But this historical oddity is worth appreciating: While it is true that school budgets depend largely on local and state spending, the federal government also makes investments that benefit public school districts across the country, and no recent major party presidential candidate has pledged to cut those investments.
Yet here we are, watching Trump talk about cutting education spending in half and acknowledging that some parts of his country will be worse off as a result.
So far, this hasn’t been much of an issue in the campaign, so don’t be surprised if that changes.
