KY educators push back on threats to cut education funding

By McKenna Horsley, Kentucky Lantern

Kentucky edu­ca­tors are not only wary of pos­si­ble fund­ing cuts under the Trump admin­is­tra­tion but also of dis­man­tling the U.S. Department of Education altogether.

Hours after mem­bers of the Kentucky Education Association (KEA) voiced oppo­si­tion to fed­er­al edu­ca­tion cuts, Democratic Lt. Gov. Jacqueline Coleman spoke along­side two Kentucky moth­ers who fear their chil­dren could lose vital school ser­vices if the fed­er­al depart­ment is dismantled.

At a Wednesday after­noon press con­fer­ence, Coleman, a for­mer edu­ca­tor her­self, focused on how gut­ting fed­er­al edu­ca­tion fund­ing could ham­string ser­vices at Kentucky’s pub­lic schools. While any gov­ern­ment agency should “strive to be as effi­cient as pos­si­ble,” she said fed­er­al fund­ing that flows through the Department of Education helps stu­dents from low-income fam­i­lies or who have disabilities.

“When it comes to the ser­vices that are pro­vid­ed and the stu­dents that depend on them, I would nev­er con­sid­er that to be waste,” Coleman said. “I think that these kids deserve the moon, and if there’s any cuts that could be made to make gov­ern­ment more effi­cient, it shouldn’t be on the backs of spe­cial edu­ca­tion students.”

Coleman said 926 schools in the state receive Title I fund­ing, which are fed­er­al dol­lars received by school dis­tricts to sup­port stu­dents from low-income fam­i­lies. If pro­grams and ser­vices are cut under IDEA, or the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, more than 114,000 Kentucky stu­dents could lose sup­port. Last year, Kentuckians received more than $370 mil­lion in fed­er­al Pell Grants, which go to stu­dents who demon­strate finan­cial need going to col­lege or earn­ing a pro­fes­sion­al degree.

Coleman, who could be a pos­si­ble can­di­date for gov­er­nor in 2027, said she and Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear have often focused on poli­cies to sup­port health and edu­ca­tion. In addi­tion to the pos­si­ble cuts for edu­ca­tion, she raised con­cerns about pos­si­ble cuts in Medicaid cov­er­age by the Trump administration. 

Eddie Campbell, the pres­i­dent of KEA, said mem­bers took actions across Kentucky Wednesday  like host­ing a “walk-in” before their school day began or wear­ing red shirts in sup­port of pub­lic edu­ca­tion. The National Education Association orga­nized events on Wednesday to back pub­lic schools.

Campbell said fund­ing from the U.S. Department of Education aids stu­dents across Kentucky, and los­ing it would jeop­ar­dize sup­port pro­grams that help stu­dents succeed.

“When a pub­lic school opens its door in the morn­ing, edu­ca­tors wel­come their stu­dents with wide-open arms,” Campbell said. “They meet them where they are, and they work with them from there and move them forward.”

President Donald Trump has said he would like to dis­man­tle the fed­er­al Department of Education and move some respon­si­bil­i­ties back to the states. It would take an act of Congress to do so. Last week, the U.S. Department of Education said it was cut­ting a sub­stan­tial num­ber of the agency’s staff, about 1,315 employ­ees, as part of a “reduc­tion in force” process. The cuts were part of efforts by Trump and his bil­lion­aire White House advis­er Elon Musk to shrink the fed­er­al work­force and slash gov­ern­ment spending.

Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, has eyed some fed­er­al offices in Kentucky for cuts. Also, both Musk and the pres­i­dent float­ed the idea of tak­ing a clos­er look at Fort Knox to make sure it is real­ly stor­ing the nation’s gold. Fort Knox, about a 45-minute dri­ve south of Louisville, hous­es the U.S. Bullion Depository and stores pre­cious met­al bul­lion reserves for the country.

Recently, Republican state law­mak­ers have attempt­ed to intro­duce their own DOGE-like groups to repli­cate the fed­er­al-lev­el efforts in Kentucky. However, the leg­is­la­tion specif­i­cal­ly for that — Senate Bill 257 and House Concurrent Resolution 50 — did not gain approval in both cham­bers before law­mak­ers recessed for Beshear’s veto peri­od begin­ning last week.

Senate Bill 25, which had sev­er­al changes made to it before it was sent to Beshear’s desk, had a floor amend­ment that includ­ed a require­ment for exec­u­tive branch depart­ments and pro­grams to sub­mit reports with “sug­ges­tions for improved gov­ern­ment efficiency.”

When asked about DOGE cuts, Beshear blast­ed Musk’s moves in his week­ly press con­fer­ence held Wednesday. Beshear said fed­er­al work­ers who have been fired from the cuts “have been deeply hurt, and in my opin­ion, they’ve been deeply wronged.”

“My con­cern is that what Elon Musk is try­ing to do is break gov­ern­ment, not fix it,” Beshear said. Listen, I think we can admit that peo­ple all across the polit­i­cal spec­trum have some issues with our fed­er­al gov­ern­ment, but the answer to that isn’t break­ing it, isn’t destroy­ing it. It’s actu­al­ly fix­ing it. It’s try­ing to sit down with oth­ers at the table and try­ing to ham­mer out dif­fer­ent ways we can do these things better.”

Kentucky Lantern is part of States Newsroom, a non­prof­it news net­work sup­port­ed by grants and a coali­tion of donors as a 501c(3) pub­lic char­i­ty. Kentucky Lantern main­tains edi­to­r­i­al inde­pen­dence. Contact Editor Jamie Lucke for ques­tions: info@kentuckylantern.com.