A federal appeals court has rejected the U.S. Department of Education’s (DOE) request to put a temporary halt on a district judge’s preliminary injunction last week, preventing the Trump administration from moving ahead with plans to dismantle the department.
Washington, D.C., and two states previously requested the court to halt the announced DOE and Trump administration’s planned Reduction in Force (RIF) of half of the remaining employees at the DOE, as well as the closure of the department.
The dismantling was announced on March 11, 2025, and two days later, the Secretary of Education, Linda McMahon, President Donald Trump and others were sued in the District of Massachusetts.
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“What is at stake in this case, the District Court found, was whether a nearly half-century-old cabinet department would be permitted to carry out its statutorily assigned functions or prevented from doing so by a mass termination of employees aimed at implementing the effective closure of that department,” the court of appeals wrote. “Given the extensive findings made by the District Court and the absence of any contrary evidence having been submitted by the appellants, we conclude that the appellants’ stay motion does not warrant our interfering with the ordinary course of appellate adjudication in the face of what the record indicates would be the apparent consequences of our doing so. The appellants’ motion for a stay is denied.”
Republican senators, in April, introduced the “Returning Education to Our States Act” after Trump signed an Executive Order to close the DOE in March.
If passed, the bill would redirect portions of the department to other federal agencies, such as the Departments of Interior, Treasury, Health and Human Services, Labor, Defense, Justice and State.
