A Senate panel on Thursday advanced former professional wrestling executive Linda McMcMahon’s nomination to lead the Department of Education, inching her toward oversight of a massive overhaul — if not outright closure — of the agency.
The Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee voted 12-11, along party lines, to send her nomination to the full Senate.
Committee Chairman Bill Cassidy, Louisiana Republican, said Ms. McMahon is the right person to shake up the department.
“For the last four years, the department focused on everything except student learning, with bureaucracy and red tape standing in the way of students’ success,” Mr. Cassidy said. “Ms. McMahon is the partner this committee needs to improve the nation’s education system.”
President Trump is pushing to shutter the agency altogether, pointing to high per-pupil spending that doesn’t seem to be producing results on standardized math and reading tests.
Schools are largely funded by state and local governments, but billions of dollars in aid and grants are funneled through the Education Department.
Ms. McMahon, the former CEO of World Wrestling Entertainment Inc. who led the Small Business Administration during Mr. Trump’s first term, testified at her confirmation hearing that, if confirmed, she would not shut down the Education Department without congressional approval.
Still, she plans to reorganize it, sending some functions to the states or to other government agencies in an attempt to improve “a system in decline.”
The changes could move the department’s Office for Civil Rights to the Justice Department, Ms. McMahon said, while the agency overseeing programs for students with learning disabilities could be moved back to the Department of Health and Human Services, where it was created decades ago.
Mr. Trump has been clear that his ultimate goal is to shutter the department.
“One other thing I’ll be doing very early in the administration is closing up the Department of Education in Washington, D.C., and sending all education and education work and needs back to the states,” Mr. Trump said in a September 2023 video.
Sen. Tim Kaine, Virginia Democrat, said he could not vote for a nominee “who will willfully engage in the destruction of the very agency she wants to lead.”
“That is disqualifying,” Mr. Kaine said.
Sen. Bernard Sanders, Vermont independent, said he respected Ms. McMahon but could not vote in favor of her nomination.
The senator warned that Mr. Trump is consolidating power so that he can call the shots on education without Ms. McMahon or Congress. Mr. Sanders said the older he gets, the more he appreciates the Founding Fathers and their vision.
“They were nobody’s fools,” Mr. Sanders said. “They understood you don’t give one branch all the power. They fought the king of England.”
Mr. Trump’s nominees are breezing through the GOP-controlled Senate, despite early concerns that some of the picks were too polarizing.
Mr. Trump’s nominee for defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, was the closest call, with Vice President J.D. Vance casting a tie-breaking vote to get him across the finish line after three Republicans broke party ranks and voted against him.
•Susan Ferrechio contributed to this story.
• Tom Howell Jr. can be reached at thowell@washingtontimes.com.