Education Department Oversight

A new Government Accountability Office report finds the Trump administration’s attempt to fire more than half the staff of the Education Department’s Office for Civil Rights ended up costing taxpayers an estimated $28.5 million to $38 million, after courts blocked the cuts and the department kept 247 employees on paid leave for roughly nine months while barring them from working. GAO says Education officials never produced a proper cost–benefit analysis of the March 2025 reduction-in-force, despite OMB and OPM rules requiring they document expected costs and savings, and instead told investigators they conveyed the analysis to the White House only "orally." OCR chief Kimberly Richey, a Trump appointee, rejected GAO’s recommendation to now do a full accounting, calling the issue moot because the RIF was rescinded and staff brought back in December, even as civil-rights complaint data show the office was dismissing about 90% of complaints during the period and entering far fewer resolution agreements. The report underscores how an ideologically driven purge of civil-rights lawyers backfired operationally and financially, burning through tens of millions of dollars while hollowing out federal enforcement of discrimination laws in schools. It also hands Congress fresh ammunition to question whether Trump’s promised "efficiency" at Education has actually meant paying sidelined attorneys not to investigate bias cases that affect students nationwide.