Federal judge blocks Trump admin moves to dismantle Dept of Education

[mystery-ak]

Federal judge blocks Trump admin moves to dismantle Dept of Education
Judge Myong Joun says congressional approval needed for department shutdown
By Anders Hagstrom Fox News
Published May 22, 2025 11:36am EDT

A federal judge blocked President Donald Trump from dismantling the Department of Education (ED) on Thursday, ruling that it cannot be done without congressional approval.

U.S. District Judge Myong Joun's order blocks the Trump administration from carrying out the mass-firing at ED announced in March and orders that any employees who were already fired be reinstated.

Joun's order noted Trump's repeated calls to shut down the department while on the campaign trail, and argued the reduction in force was his means of doing so.

"The idea that Defendants’ actions are merely a ‘reorganization’ is plainly not true," Joun wrote.



"Defendants do acknowledge, as they must, that the Department cannot be shut down without Congress’s approval, yet they simultaneously claim that their legislative goals (obtaining Congressional approval to shut down the Department) are distinct from their administrative goals (improving efficiency). There is nothing in the record to support these contradictory positions," his ruling continues.

The DOE rejected Joun's ruling in a statement to Fox News Digital, labeling him a "far-left judge" who "overstepped his authority."

"President Trump and the Senate-confirmed Secretary of Education clearly have the authority to make decisions about agency reorganization efforts, not an unelected Judge with a political axe to grind," spokeswoman Madi Biedermann said in a statement. "This ruling is not in the best interest of American students or families. We will immediately challenge this on an emergency basis."

more
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/federal-judge-blocks-trump-admin-from-dismantling-dept-education

[ironhorsedriver]

When is something going to be done about lower level judges having More say than the elected President?

[mountaineer]

This is on Speaker Johnson. Trump's EOs - at least the ones like this -  need to be codified. Now.

[MeganC]

I don't recall voting for Myong Joun.

[Free Vulcan]

The judge can make the point that DOE is a creation of Congress and can't be abolished, but he has no authority to say how many people must be employed there.

[Bigun]

https://twitter.com/kylenabecker/status/1925589950726041670

[Hoodat]

A federal judge blocked President Donald Trump from dismantling the Department of Education (ED) on Thursday, ruling that it cannot be done without congressional approval.

Her basis?

[andy58-in-nh]

The judge can make the point that DOE is a creation of Congress and can't be abolished, but he has no authority to say how many people must be employed there.

The judge is a Biden appointee, as you may have guessed.

I think there are two ways to stop this nonsense.

One: Congress can pass legislation to eliminate or reduce the functions of the Department of Education. This is the more difficult path, as it would require the expenditure of political time, energy and capital, and would need to be repeated every single time a local District Court judge issued a ruling with nationwide effect. Congress could also eliminate Federal district courts since they created them, but that would be even more difficult, politically-speaking.

Two: the Supreme Court must rule that Federal district court judges are not empowered to issue nationwide injunctions, but rather only to rule on facts pertinent to the actual plaintiffs in a present case within their own district.

Otherwise, the Executive Branch will be made subservient to the Judiciary in ways that our Founders never intended, and elections would be rendered meaningless in cases where even a single judge of the political party that lost the prior national election can stop a President of the party that won the election from exercising the Constitutional powers of their office.

[Bigun]

The judge is a Biden appointee, as you may have guessed.

I think there are two ways to stop this nonsense.

One: Congress can pass legislation to eliminate or reduce the functions of the Department of Education. This is the more difficult path, as it would require the expenditure of political time, energy and capital, and would need to be repeated every single time a local District Court judge issued a ruling with nationwide effect. Congress could also eliminate Federal district courts since they created them, but that would be even more difficult, politically-speaking.

Two: the Supreme Court must rule that Federal district court judges are not empowered to issue nationwide injunctions, but rather only to rule on facts pertinent to the actual plaintiffs in a present case within their own district.

Otherwise, the Executive Branch will be made subservient to the Judiciary in ways that our Founders never intended, and elections would be rendered meaningless in cases where even a single judge of the political party that lost the prior national election can stop a President of the party that won the election from exercising the Constitutional powers of their office.

If I may be so bold @andy58-in-nh

Three: The Executive tells these rouge district court judges to go pound sand and moves on.

[Free Vulcan]

The judge is a Biden appointee, as you may have guessed.

I think there are two ways to stop this nonsense.

One: Congress can pass legislation to eliminate or reduce the functions of the Department of Education. This is the more difficult path, as it would require the expenditure of political time, energy and capital, and would need to be repeated every single time a local District Court judge issued a ruling with nationwide effect. Congress could also eliminate Federal district courts since they created them, but that would be even more difficult, politically-speaking.

Two: the Supreme Court must rule that Federal district court judges are not empowered to issue nationwide injunctions, but rather only to rule on facts pertinent to the actual plaintiffs in a present case within their own district.

Otherwise, the Executive Branch will be made subservient to the Judiciary in ways that our Founders never intended, and elections would be rendered meaningless in cases where even a single judge of the political party that lost the prior national election can stop a President of the party that won the election from exercising the Constitutional powers of their office.

There is a law moving thru Congress trying to at least accomplish 2), where it is at I don't know.

[jafo2010]

The time has come to defund these judges.  If we have 600 federal judges, I say cut their numbers in half, with the promise to cut them again if they do not back the f*** off and remain in their own pasture!

Again, what do you expect from f***ing lying thieving lawyers, who have moved up to being judges?   All ***holes!!!!!!!!!

[Fishrrman]

Vulcan wrote:
"The judge can make the point that DOE is a creation of Congress and can't be abolished, but he has no authority to say how many people must be employed there"

Don't "dismantle" it.
Scale it down to about 40 employees.
(That was easy)

[andy58-in-nh]

If I may be so bold @andy58-in-nh

Three: The Executive tells these rouge district court judges to go pound sand and moves on.

Well... @Bigun ... there is the "Andrew Jackson option" available, for sure.

But this country is far different in several key respects than it was back in the early part of the 19th century, and I suspect those differences would make it hard for a President to succeed with such a strategy.

We live in an age of instant communication, powered not only by a very one-sided opposition media, but by literally thousands of left-wing NGO's and their mass communication outlets. Their screams and howls would be deafening - and instantly available on millions of devices residing in the pockets of nearly everyone. And having been dumbed down by public school dominance, far too many Americans are more influenced today by appeals to emotion than to history, logic and reason.

In Old Hickory's age, news of a Presidential edict might take weeks to reach a majority of the much-smaller American populace, if they ever heard the "news" at all. Many folks were too busy trying to fight off Indians and harvest enough food and fuel to survive the winter to much care about obscure legal goings-on in Washington, D.C., most of which did not truly affect their daily lives.   

Today, the national government has metastasized into a monstrous entity that affects the daily lives of people in ways that 19th century Americans could not possibly fathom.

Our culture is now enured to dependency more than independence, which is to say (in this context) that our government overlords are now largely appointed rather than elected, and the elected ones are increasingly insulated from responsibility by means of accumulated power and money and also by the proliferation of their own intentionally unintelligible legal legerdemain. 

[Bigun]

Well... @Bigun ... there is the "Andrew Jackson option" available, for sure.

But this country is far different in several key respects than it was back in the early part of the 19th century, and I suspect those differences would make it hard for a President to succeed with such a strategy.

We live in an age of instant communication, powered not only by a very one-sided opposition media, but by literally thousands of left-wing NGO's and their mass communication outlets. Their screams and howls would be deafening - and instantly available on millions of devices residing in the pockets of nearly everyone. And having been dumbed down by public school dominance, far too many Americans are more influenced today by appeals to emotion than to history, logic and reason.

In Old Hickory's age, news of a Presidential edict might take weeks to reach a majority of the much-smaller American populace, if they ever heard the "news" at all. Many folks were too busy trying to fight off Indians and harvest enough food and fuel to survive the winter to much care about obscure legal goings-on in Washington, D.C., most of which did not truly affect their daily lives.   

Today, the national government has metastasized into a monstrous entity that affects the daily lives of people in ways that 19th century Americans could not possibly fathom.

Our culture is now enured to dependency more than independence, which is to say (in this context) that our government overlords are now largely appointed rather than elected, and the elected ones are increasingly insulated from responsibility by means of accumulated power and money and also by the proliferation of their own intentionally unintelligible legal legerdemain.

@andy58-in-nh I cannot argue with any of that except to say that IMHO it's long past time for an American President to disabuse folks of their ill-founded notions about how things are supposed to work in our constitutional republic.

[Fishrrman]

Bigun wrote (replying to Andy):
"I cannot argue with any of that except to say that IMHO it's long past time for an American President to disabuse folks of their ill-founded notions about how things are supposed to work in our constitutional republic."

Which is why I propose "The Trump Doctrine" to redefine the role of the U.S. Court system in its relationship to the president.

Goes all the way back to February, please see this post:
https://www.gopbriefingroom.com/index.php/topic,553316.msg3138719.html#msg3138719

Essentially, it's time to toss Marbury v. Madison.
It's not up to the courts -- even the Supreme Court -- to set their own boundaries.
That is the role of the president and the Congress.

Back when I originally posted it, you disagreed.
Yet now, you seem to be of a similar mind.
What happened?

[Bigun]

Bigun wrote (replying to Andy):
"I cannot argue with any of that except to say that IMHO it's long past time for an American President to disabuse folks of their ill-founded notions about how things are supposed to work in our constitutional republic."

Which is why I propose "The Trump Doctrine" to redefine the role of the U.S. Court system in its relationship to the president.

Goes all the way back to February, please see this post:
https://www.gopbriefingroom.com/index.php/topic,553316.msg3138719.html#msg3138719

Essentially, it's time to toss Marbury v. Madison.
It's not up to the courts -- even the Supreme Court -- to set their own boundaries.
That is the role of the president and the Congress.

Back when I originally posted it, you disagreed.
Yet now, you seem to be of a similar mind.
What happened?

I think you have me confused with someone else @Fishrrman as I have always argued that Marbury is the very first instance I can find of the court granting itself powers not found anywhere in the constitution. I distinctly remember having a long argument with a former member here on that exact subject.

[DefiantMassRINO]

Time for a Department of Education re-organization ... eliminate all positions, create new positions, force everyone to re-apply for a new position ... maybe HR slow rolls the hiring process so the positions remain unfilled.