Donald Trump made a campaign promise to eliminate the Department of Education, but that will never come to fruition, an expert said Saturday.
Former President Barack Obama's Education Secretary, Arne Duncan, appeared on MSNBC over the weekend to discuss Trump's vow to end the department Duncan once led.
The host, Alex Witt, noted that a bill to accomplish that goal "would require support from Democrats to get these 60 Senate votes needed to pass it, which is extremely unlikely."
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"So can this effort succeed under Trump?" she asked.
Duncan responded, "First of all, this is never going to happen."
"This is just another broken Trump campaign promise like building the wall, saying Mexico is going to pay for the wall. Not going to happen. Whether his supporters ever feel misled or betrayed, I don't know, but it makes no sense to close the Department of Education," he said. "So much of the funding goes to children with disabilities. 7.5 million children across the country with disabilities who get access to a free and fair public education because of the Department of Education's funds, and last time I checked, Alex, those children are the children of parents who happened to vote Republican, who happened to vote Democratic."
He added, "It truly doesn't matter. This is a smoke screen. 90% of the funding for public education comes at the local level from states and districts, not at the federal level, so this is not a serious attempt to help us educate our way to a better economy. This is about politicizing, weaponizing education, which has no benefits for any of our children."
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