At a Senate Appropriations Committee hearing on Tuesday, Sen. Jack Reed (D-RI) questioned Education Sec. Linda McMahon about her budget request for education.
00:00Thank you very much. Welcome, Madam Secretary. I'm not a great mathematician, but I think you were talking about a trillion dollars. I believe 1.5 billion times 10 is 15 billion dollars. That's a little bit off from a trillion dollars.
00:16I think the budget cuts 1.2 billion.
00:19Well, 1.2, that would be 12 billion dollars, not a trillion dollars.
00:24Okay. Fine. Why aren't you recommending an audit for the TRIO program, if that's what the problem is?
00:30We're not allowed to audit it.
00:33Legislatively, you could propose that.
00:35We could propose it, which is what I had said at the very beginning. I would look forward.
00:39You're not proposing the audit. You're proposing to essentially constrain the program, put it into a block grant,
00:47and without any request for audit language, which would come from the United States Senate.
00:54Well, that's exactly what I would request.
00:56Well, why don't you request, Madam Secretary?
00:58Yes, I would like to do that.
00:59Well...
01:00If Congress is going to appropriate, again, money for the TRIO programs, then I would like to work with Congress,
01:08and part of that would be auditing.
01:09Well...
01:10We've found that about 92% of the TRIO funds go to the same people all of the time, the same institutions.
01:16That could indeed imply an audit necessary, but it doesn't validate the budgetary approach you're taking.
01:27You're taking, basically, many programs, combining them from $8 billion total to $2 billion to a block grant.
01:36Now, in Washington, the block grant is the slow path to extinction,
01:41because next year, the request will be for probably $8 billion, and four or five years from now,
01:48when the request is still $8 billion, the cost will far exceed that.
01:53That's sort of budgeting 101.
01:57So you're really out to eliminate these programs, I think, not to make them more efficient.
02:03That's not true.
02:03I disagree with that.
02:04Well...
02:05There are some budget cuts, but what we're asking for is a simplified funding measure,
02:09which will be a single grant funding to the states for them to use in the best way possible
02:16to make sure their education is working better.
02:18No.
02:18All right.
02:19However, the other side of that, if I may, sir, is that we are reducing the regulatory burden.
02:24Do you know that 47 cents of every dollar that goes into a school teachers spend complying with regulation?
02:30So if we can take away that regulatory burden, yes, while there are some cuts in the cost of funding,
02:37we still give the opportunity to have more dollars because we're reducing the regulatory burden.
02:42Well, let me understand this.
02:44You're very enthusiastic about an audit, but the regulatory burden is so crippling.
02:51An audit would impose more requirements on the schools.
02:55I just think you're coming and going, and we're not making progress.
03:01The cut to these programs is profound.
03:04Six billion dollars.
03:06And the states are not going to step up and say, we can do this.
03:09I'll tell you why.
03:10Because if this budget passed, every state in this country is going to make a difficult decision.
03:15Do I save my health care system, or do I save my public education system?
03:21Many of them can't do both.
03:23And this will be a profound shock to the education systems around the country.
03:30In one year, a loss of these funds, and to the students that need it.
03:35Well, what we have found, sir...
03:36Have you ever taken public assistance?
03:38Have I ever taken public assistance?
03:40No, sir.
03:41No?
03:42Not at all?
03:43No, sir.
03:45Well, many people do.
03:46And they need that support to get ahead.
03:53And education is a key mechanism to go ahead.
03:56I'm over my...
03:57No, I still have some time.
03:59To get ahead.
04:01And it's remarkable.
04:03I think, you know, this all sort of started with the GI Bill, when a generation of Americans
04:10got to education who never could get before.
04:13And then Senator Pell, my colleague, sort of saw that model and increased it.
04:17By the way, you're also decreasing the Pell grants.
04:21You're shrinking educational opportunity in the United States for a whole generation and more.
04:27And also shrinking our ability to compete internationally and globally.
04:31Because I don't think the Chinese will slack off in their investments in education.
04:37Senator, I appreciate your comments.
04:39However, we have spent $3 trillion since 1980 on education in our country when this department
04:45was set up.
04:45And our scores have continued to go down.
04:48We are not doing something right.
04:50And your numbers are a little bit off on a number.
04:52We're going to have about...
04:53It's still a cut.
04:54But it's about a $4.5 billion cut, not $8 billion cut.
04:58Well, it's a significant cut.
05:00And...
05:01To be more responsible.
05:03To be more responsible.
05:04Your responsibility amounts to just surrendering.
05:08Sorry, sir?
05:09Surrendering.
05:10We have this crisis in education, illiteracy, all these factors.
05:14What we're going to do is pull back, let the states do it.
05:17No, we'll spend it more responsibly.
05:18I doubt it very seriously.
05:20Let's hope we do.
05:21Well, hope, as someone said, is not a plan.
05:26All right, Senator Britt.
05:27Madam Secretary, thank you so much for being here today.
