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As President Donald Trump took office for a second time, he pledged to use executive power to roll back rights for transgender people and immigrants — actions likely to reverberate in American schools.
Trump’s 29-minute inaugural address described a nation in decline, where “the pillars of our society lay broken and seemingly in complete disrepair.” He said his administration would reverse course and declared: “The golden age of America begins right now.”
That description of a faltering America extended to the nation’s schools.
“We have an education system that teaches our children to be ashamed of themselves in many cases, to hate our country despite the love that we try so desperately to provide to them,” Trump said. “All of this will change starting today, and it will change very quickly.”
Trump has pledged to rapidly reshape the federal government using executive orders. At a post-inaugural rally at the Capital One Arena, Trump signed nine executive orders, tossing the pens he used to his cheering supporters before leaving the arena for the White House. He is expected to sign dozens of additional executive orders Monday evening.
The impact of those executive orders will depend in part on how state and local leaders and advocates respond. Executive orders must have some basis in law, and past orders have been challenged successfully in court. Vague orders can prove difficult to enforce.
According to media reports and Trump’s inaugural address, the president will order the federal government to recognize just two genders, male and female, as defined by a person’s biological sex assigned at birth. Trump reportedly will order federal funds withheld from programs that recognize the existence of transgender people. It’s not clear how broadly such an order would be applied and how it might affect schools that respect transgender and non-binary students’ gender identities or use inclusive curriculums.
Trump made opposition to transgender rights and inclusion in public life a centerpiece of his campaign, alongside anti-immigrant rhetoric.
The move to define sex in ways hostile to transgender rights comes just after a federal judge blocked the Biden administration’s rewrite of Title IX rules, which had made protections for transgender students more explicit. Changing the federal definition of sex could make it harder for transgender students to defend their rights or pursue civil rights complaints.
Media reports also indicate that Trump will attempt to end birthright citizenship, a right enshrined in the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution and repeatedly found by the courts to apply to all people born in the United States, with the exception of children born to foreign diplomats, regardless of their parents’ immigration status. Trump did not mention this plan in his inaugural address, and it was not among the first orders he signed.
Such an executive order would not, on its own, prevent children with immigrant parents and those who are themselves undocumented from attending public school. The 1982 U.S. Supreme Court decision Plyler v. Doe requires schools to educate all students in their communities, regardless of immigration status.
The Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank closely tied to Trump, has called on states to challenge that decision. Earlier this month, Oklahoma ordered schools to start collecting information on the immigration status of families with children enrolled in public school, but a number of school districts immediately said they would not comply.
Executive orders touch on federal workforce, free speech, immigration
The first executive orders Trump signed rescinded 78 presidential actions by his predecessor, former President Joe Biden, prevented the issuance of any new federal regulations, and froze all federal hiring, with exceptions for the military, “until full control of the government is achieved.”
He also ordered the federal workforce to work in the office, starting immediately, a move that could prove disruptive for employees who need to make changes to child care or elder care; withdrew the U.S. from the Paris Climate Accords, and ordered the restoration of free speech.
It was not immediately clear what implications the free speech order would have in a country divided over removing books from public school libraries and appropriate limits to on-campus protests.
In his inaugural address, Trump said he would declare a national emergency at the southern border and reinstate the Remain in Mexico policy that prevents asylum seekers from entering the United States to have their claims heard. Within minutes of the speech, migrants who had pending appointments at the border got messages that those appointments had been canceled.
Many executive orders are expected to facilitate enhanced immigration enforcement. Around the country, schools are sharing messages of support with families who could be caught up in enforcement actions and encouraging parents to make sure their children’s emergency contacts are up to date in case caregivers are detained. Some school systems are also clarifying how they will respond if immigration agents seek entrance to their buildings, with many saying they will consult their attorneys and only allow agents with signed judicial warrants to enter their schools.
Current policy limits immigration enforcement near schools, but media reports in December suggested Trump may rescind the “sensitive locations” policy.
The president also promised to “end the chronic disease epidemic and keep our children safe, healthy and disease-free.”
On the campaign trail, Trump promised to withhold funds from schools that require students to be vaccinated, something that it’s not clear he has the authority to do. His nominee to be Secretary of Health and Human Services, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., is a noted vaccine skeptic who tried to block the distribution of the COVID-19 vaccine at the height of the pandemic.
Trump is also expected to remove civil service protections from many federal employees and expand the positions considered political appointees, a move that could have major implications for the U.S. Department of Education and the Department of Health and Human Services. In the first Trump administration, the president and his allies contended that career bureaucrats who make up the core of the federal workforce blocked many of their initiatives.
This is a developing story and will be updated.
Erica Meltzer is Chalkbeat’s national editor based in Colorado. Contact Erica at emeltzer@chalkbeat.org.
