| Speaker | Time | Text |
|---|---|---|
| Two to Rule 2 of the rules of the U.S. House of Representatives. | ||
| The clerk received the following message from the Secretary of the Senate on February 13th, 2025 at 4.29 p.m. that the Senate passed Senate 146. | ||
| Signed sincerely, Kevin F. McCumber. | ||
| Pursuant to clause 13 of Rule 1, the House stands, the House stands adjourned until 1 p.m. on Tuesday, February 18th, 2025. | ||
|
unidentified
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The House is gaveled out. | |
| Members will be back for legislative business on February 24th. | ||
| This week, the House passed various bills related to veterans, finance, law enforcement evasion penalties, and the authority of Congress over executive regulations. | ||
| Off the floor, late yesterday, House Republicans advanced their budget resolution for fiscal year 2025, sending it to the full chamber for further consideration. | ||
| Also on the congressional checklist, a spending package to fund the federal government before it runs out of money in a month. | ||
| Follow live coverage of the House here on C-SPAN, on our website, C-SPAN.org, and on our free app, C-SPANNOW. | ||
| I've ever seen in my life my kids didn't go to the public schools in Duval County because they were so substandard. | ||
| And, you know, unfortunately, there are good teachers in the Duval County system, but they have to buy materials for the kids themselves. | ||
| They have to. | ||
| So, John, then when you hear the Education Secretary and Republicans talk about sending education down to the state level and not having a federal government agency, what's your reaction to that idea? | ||
|
unidentified
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Bad idea. | |
| We have a governor, a racist governor, who is trying to take African-American studies out of school. | ||
| African-American studies are part of American history. | ||
| And this banana republic leader that we have who looks like Matt from Mad Magazine, but you could cut me off if you wanted to. | ||
| But this guy is a racist. | ||
| And that's the problem. | ||
| If you let the states handle it, you're going to get, there's not going to be any continuity on how people should be educated in this country. | ||
| And that's all I have to say. | ||
| All right. | ||
| John's thoughts there. | ||
| Is the Democratic caller? | ||
| Myra is in Chestertown, Maryland. | ||
| Myra, good morning to you. | ||
| Welcome to our conversation this morning. | ||
| So how would you change education? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Good morning to you. | |
| Also, my concern is for the last four years, there isn't any homework. | ||
| I think children are so far behind in Chestertown, Maryland due to this. | ||
| There's just, they don't have anything to, how can I say this, to keep themselves occupied like we did when I was a child. | ||
| I just think education, they need to put more homework, bring it back to where we used to have it. | ||
| That's what I'm concerned about. | ||
| I think they would learn more. | ||
| Okay. | ||
| All right, Myra, calling for more homework in our nation's schools. | ||
| Her changes to the education policy here in the United States. | ||
| Gwen in Detroit, Democratic caller. | ||
| Hi, Gwen. | ||
| We'll hear from you next. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Hi, thanks for taking my call. | |
| Well, you know, what changes should be made to education in the United States? | ||
| This is not a normal, I mean, we're acting like, okay, what's going to, what should we do today? | ||
| What should we do tomorrow? | ||
| Our Education Department is being taken over. | ||
| One thing, let me go hang up. | ||
| No, you just hung up on me? | ||
| No, I'm nowhere near the button, Gwen. | ||
| Go ahead. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Okay, okay. | |
| One thing we don't need, one thing we don't need is for Christian religion, Christian nationalism, they put in our schools a Trump Bible on every desk. | ||
| We don't need to be converted. | ||
| You know what I'm saying? | ||
| So this is not normal. | ||
| We shouldn't be asking, what should we do? | ||
| We should be asking, how can we stop this takeover? | ||
| And when you say takeover, are you referring to a takeover of the Education Department? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes, that means they kicked everybody out. | |
| They locked the doors. | ||
| You know, not just the education, our government. | ||
| What can we do to stop this takeover? | ||
| Because that's what's happening. | ||
| All right. | ||
| Lydia, Easton, Maryland, Independent. | ||
| Hi, Lydia. | ||
| Good morning to you. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Good morning. | |
| Thank you for taking my call. | ||
| I think that we have to consider when they talk about the United States is top spending in education. | ||
| The other countries don't have all the extracurricular activities, the sports, the music, all the travel that kids do after school at our expense. | ||
| So we're not comparing apples and apples. | ||
| We're comparing apples and oranges. | ||
| If you want to cut the costs, then cut all those extracurricular programs. | ||
| Thank you very much for taking my call. | ||
| Anna in California, Democratic caller. | ||
| Anna, we are getting your thoughts this morning on changes to the education system in this country. | ||
| Good morning. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Good morning. | |
| I cannot believe that all our children, and I mean all our children, what this change, what this new administration is trying to do is erase history, erase difference, erase everything that means that you are a human being and reducing it to saving money. | ||
| I cannot believe the heartless. | ||
| Well, give me an example of what you're referring to. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Oh, trans people, trans children. | |
| Even scientifically, we know there is not just a man and a woman. | ||
| We have evolved. | ||
| Can we be human? | ||
| Can we please be human and stop talking about taking things away from children? | ||
| All right. | ||
| Anna, you may be interested in this moment from the confirmation hearing for Linda McMahon to serve as Education Secretary. | ||
| Here's Senator Chris Murphy of Connecticut questioning the nominee about President Trump's executive order eliminating funding for programs that support DEI, that's diversity, equity, and inclusion, and what that means for public schools. | ||
| If a school in Connecticut celebrates Martin Luther King Day and has a series of events and programming teaching about black history, are they in violation of a policy that says schools should stop running DEI programs? | ||
| Not in my view. | ||
| That is clearly not the case. | ||
| The celebration of Martin Luther King Day and Black History Month should be celebrated throughout all of our schools. | ||
| I believe that Martin Luther King was one of the strongest proponents of making sure that we look at all of our populations when he said that he would hope that his children wouldn't be judged by the color of their skin, but the content of their character. | ||
| And I think that is the fundamental basis that we should celebrate Black History Month. | ||
| Point has closed down all ethnic clubs so the Society of Black Engineers no longer can meet because they believe that to be in compliance with this order they cannot have groups structured around ethnic or racial affiliations. | ||
| Would schools, would public schools be in violation of this order? | ||
| Would they risk funding if they had clubs that students could belong to based on their racial or ethnic identity? | ||
| Well, I certainly today don't want to address hypothetical situations. | ||
| I would like, once I'm confirmed, to get in and assess these programs, look at what has been. | ||
| Is that a pretty easy one? | ||
| I mean, you're saying that it's a possibility that if a school has a club for Vietnamese American students or black students where they meet after school, that they could be potentially in jeopardy of receiving federal funding? | ||
| Again, I would like to fully understand what that order is and what those clubs are doing. | ||
| That's pretty chilling. | ||
| I think schools all around the country are going to hear that. | ||
| What about educational programming centered around specific ethnic and racial experiences? | ||
| My son is in a public school. | ||
| He takes a class called African American History. | ||
| If you're running an African American history class, could you perhaps be in violation of this corridor, of this executive order? | ||
| I'm not quite certain, and I'd like to look into it further and get back to you on that. | ||
| So there's a possibility, there's a possibility, you're saying, that public schools that run African American history classes, right? | ||
| This is a class that has been taught in public schools for decades, could lose federal funding if they continue to teach African American history. | ||
| No, that's not what I'm saying. | ||
| I'm saying that I would like to take a look at these programs and fully understand the breadth of the executive order and get back to you on that. | ||
| Lyndon McMahon sitting before senators yesterday at a confirmation hearing, getting peppered with questions about how she would steer the Education Department in the second term of the Trump administration. | ||
| The Education Department this morning is our topic for our conversation. | ||
| What changes would you make? | ||
| Here are the numbers for the federal department. | ||
| It began operating in 1980. | ||
| It employs 4,400 people and has a budget of $238 billion for 2024, a 1.8% of the overall federal budget. | ||
| 1.8% of it is this money for the Education Department. | ||
| Jerry and Orr, Minnesota, or Republican. | ||
| Jerry, we'll go to you next. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thanks for taking my call. | |
| I believe in dismantling the federal department of education. | ||
| Like you say, it began in 1980. | ||
| Before 1980, we never had a Department of Education on a federal level. | ||
| Every state has departments of education. | ||
| Every local school district has duly elected people who run the school districts. | ||
| And that's good enough. | ||
| We did a very good job with that for about 200 years, and we should dismantle the U.S. Department of Education. | ||
| All right, Jerry, Republican from Minnesota. | ||
| His thoughts. | ||
| Ruby in Richmond, Virginia. | ||
| What do you say, Ruby? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes. | |
| People probably don't know the history of this, but in 1954, they closed the schools in Prince A. William County and rather obeyed the law of the land. | ||
| And I went there in 1965 as a volunteer student. | ||
| And some of the people who lived there told me that when they got through with the, when the white kids got through with the books, then they gave them to the black kids who were all raggedy and torn up. | ||
| So we need the federal government to overlook things. | ||
| And I really get tired of people always bad mouthing education because we live in a state of Virginia where it used to be against the law to teach black people how to read. | ||
| And I'm from Michigan. | ||
| So that's all I want to say. | ||
| All right, Ruby, NPR.org has an article that outlines what the U.S. Education Department does and doesn't do. | ||
| Two of the most important federal funding streams to public schools are Title I, which provides money to help districts that serve lower income communities. | ||
| In 2023, the Education Department received more than $18 billion for Title I. | ||
| The IDA, IDEA, Individuals with Disability Education Act, this is another funding stream, which provides money to help districts serve students with disabilities. | ||
| In fiscal year 2024, the department received more than $15 billion for this funding stream. | ||
| Both of these, like the department itself, created by separate acts of Congress. | ||
| Title I was signed into law in 1965, and this Disabilities Act was signed into law in 1975. | ||
| They cannot be unwound except by Congress. | ||
| Large changes to either are unlikely as the money enjoys broad bipartisan support. | ||
| Carrie in Locust Grove, Georgia. | ||
| Good morning to you. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Carrie. | |
| Good morning, Greta. | ||
| Thanks for taking my call. | ||
| I'm retired Navy 20 years, but I also taught high school ROTC for 20 years. | ||
| And throwing money at things, it probably helps in a certain way. | ||
| But what I see is the biggest problem is the lack of parental involvement. | ||
| If we can find ways to make parents more responsible for the child's education, I think that would be a big help. | ||
| And how do you do that, Carrie? | ||
| How do you force parents to be more involved? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Okay, I'll give an example. | |
| My first nine years of teaching, I taught at a private Catholic school. | ||
| If a kid didn't obey the rules and, say, for example, got Saturday school, the parents would have to pay for them to go to Saturday school because the school had to pay the teacher. | ||
| So financially, if it's an impact to families financially, that might wake up some of these parents. | ||
| But I'm telling you, Greta, these parents don't get involved. | ||
| They don't get involved with their kids. | ||
| Only area I see them get involved with their kids is sports. | ||
| When it comes to academics, you very seldom see them. | ||
| I got a friend that teaches honors classes. | ||
| He said he had four parents come for open house this year. | ||
| So that's my thoughts about it. | ||
| All right. | ||
| Carrie there in Georgia. | ||
| We'll go to Arkansas, Jonesboro. | ||
| Carol, good morning to you, Republican. | ||
| It's your turn. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Okay, good morning. | |
| How are y'all today? | ||
| Morning. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Good. | |
| Okay. | ||
| I got several things, but I hope I can not be so nervous. | ||
| I'm sorry. | ||
| Oh, don't worry about it. | ||
| Take your time. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Okay. | |
| Okay. | ||
| I just want to answer one thing that you took a call from a lady from Nevada. | ||
| And she said she wanted the Bibles from Trump's Bibles taken out of the schools. | ||
| There is no Bibles with Trump on them. | ||
| So sorry. | ||
| Okay. | ||
| There is three things that have bothered me. | ||
| When COVID hit, I had two grandchildren. | ||
| One of them, she's my oldest, and she was in high school. | ||
| And then I had the youngest grandson. | ||
| And they both went to school for a little while. | ||
| And then I think the first semester and then the second one, they said they had to do, I guess, work off a computer or something at home. | ||
| And the teachers weren't paying attention to them and checking their homework every week and all this stuff. | ||
| Well, to get the kids, make sure they pass school and all this, they didn't check their homework. | ||
| The kids were having trouble with their homework, need to ask questions. | ||
| The teachers would ignore them. | ||
| So Carol. | ||
| What does that mean for today and changes you would make today to the education system? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Okay. | |
| For me, what I would like to see done, these teachers are given, you give them an inch and they're going to take a mile. | ||
| Are you referring to the unions that represent them? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes, because they get out here and they start yelling that they want more money, they want this, they want that. | |
| Then they turn around and you give them all that stuff and then they don't want to help our kids. | ||
| They don't want to teach them. | ||
| All right. | ||
| Joan, Crestview, Florida, Independent. | ||
| Hi, Joan. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Hi, good morning. | |
| Thanks for taking my call. | ||
| Morning. | ||
|
unidentified
|
I just have a different perspective. | |
| I think that there's a social contract that exists between the federal government and individuals and organizations. | ||
| And I just, I was born in 58. | ||
| I remember segregation. | ||
| I remember desegregation. | ||
| I was young, but it impacted me. | ||
| I'm really at this oral level. | ||
| It really meant a lot to me because I lived in a society that I felt treated people differently socioeconomically. | ||
| If you came from one background, you got this, and so on and so forth. | ||
| So to me, I think it's a break of a contract, and I respectfully disagree with changing the federal government's oversight. | ||
| I don't know the long-term impact. | ||
| I don't know the specific cuts that are going on. | ||
| But I know that when you leave communities to their own choices, sometimes those choices are not in the best interest of the community. | ||
| And I just remember on desegregation. | ||
| I remember Congress originally, I think it was in 1896, had determined that segregation between people of color and people that were not was legalized. | ||
| And then it took until the 50s to reverse that decision. | ||
| And I just remember seeing some horrible things on television. | ||
| I remember seeing Walter Conkite. | ||
| I remember all of it. | ||
| And I was just a baby. | ||
| So you want to go back? | ||
| Your concern is if you do away with the federal education department, that states could reverse course and go back to that part of our society, part of our history of segregation. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes, ma'am, I do. | |
| I grew up in a privileged life, and I always felt some remorse for people who did not. | ||
| And I could see the differences, and I could see discrimination occurring, even if it wasn't in my own backyard. | ||
| I could see it on a global scale. | ||
| It still occurs. | ||
| We have racism in this country. | ||
| And I think it gives power to those that will perhaps misuse their power because of their perspective. | ||
| And I think that when you look at things from the top down, I would prefer that we maintain any ability to not go back in that direction. | ||
| And that comes from federal oversight. | ||
| Got it, Joan. | ||
| All right. | ||
| From that NPR article that we cited earlier, the Department of Education has no power over what's taught in schools. | ||
| Over the years, President Trump has vowed to rid America's school of such ideas as wokeness and critical race theory. | ||
| And he has said that he would close the Education Department in order to return all education and education work and needs back to the States. | ||
| In reality, it is already up to the States to determine what is taught in classrooms. | ||
| Nick, who's an educator in Michigan. | ||
| Nick, what grade do you teach? | ||
|
unidentified
|
I'm a university professor. | |
| My mother was a school teacher, and all her sisters were school teachers, as well as my paternal grandfather. | ||
| And I've been a professor for 42 years. | ||
| And I teach in one of the top public universities in the country. | ||
| And sometimes it's ranked number one public university in the country. | ||
| And you cannot, you will not believe the poor quality of the students that we get. | ||
| They don't learn anything in high school. | ||
| We have to spend the first two years to teach them the things they should have learned in high school. | ||
| Like what? | ||
| Give us examples. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Mathematics, physics, everything. | |
| They are deficient in everything, even English. | ||
| Now. | ||
| Well, wait, Nick, before you go on, just give us a little bit more, though. | ||
| Mathematics, where are they falling behind? | ||
| What do they need to know that they don't know? | ||
|
unidentified
|
I don't have much time, and I have a lot of points to make. | |
| So they are behind in everything. | ||
| And those people that say we don't have enough money in education, we don't spend enough money, that's totally 100% false. | ||
| We spend the highest amount in the world, and we get the poorest results. | ||
| Why? | ||
| It's the mentality. | ||
| It's the mentality. | ||
| Education is hard. | ||
| People should try much harder in high schools, both the professors, the teachers, and the students. | ||
| Parents should take this very seriously. | ||
| They cannot graduate illiterate children. | ||
| They have to speak English. | ||
| They have to know mathematics. | ||
| We have done studies and mathematics. | ||
| Your knowledge of mathematics determines how much money you will make. | ||
| The more you know of mathematics, the better salaries you will have. | ||
| Now, I go to China and teach in China. | ||
| I really have a lot of experiences. | ||
| Are you listening? | ||
| Yes, still listening. | ||
| You went to China? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes. | |
| I asked the Chinese students, the Chinese professors, why are they so good in math? | ||
| It's because they do 20 hours a week math. | ||
| And in the U.S., in the high schools, they play football and they have cheerleaders. | ||
| Well, they should hit the books. | ||
| They should hit the books real hard. | ||
| It is not a matter of money. | ||
| The education department has made no difference. | ||
| They wasted billions, and people are worse educated today than before the education department was founded. | ||
| So I wouldn't care less if the education department is closed down or if it continues to do nothing. | ||
| All right. | ||
| Jeremy, Ontario, California, Republican. | ||
| Jeremy, good morning. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Good morning. | |
| Thank you for taking my call. | ||
| Yeah, I kind of agree with the guy who just kind of called in. | ||
| On that note, you asked what changes I would make to kind of improve the education system. | ||
| I think I just make the curriculum, change the curriculum itself, make it more relevant, more engaging. | ||
| I don't think it's up to date with some of the jobs that are available to people as a result of being educated. | ||
| So I think there's no attention paid by the student, and there's definitely not enough engagement by the parent. | ||
| So I guess the answer to my question would be that I would change the curriculum and just make it more engaging. | ||
| Okay. | ||
| All right. | ||
| And Jeremy, how old are you? | ||
|
unidentified
|
I'm 40. | |
| Well, turning 40 this year, so 40. | ||
| All right. | ||
| Democratic caller Jenny in Stowe, Ohio. | ||
| Hi, Jenny. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Hi. | |
| Can you hear me? | ||
| We can. | ||
| So what changes would you make? | ||
|
unidentified
|
First of all, I think you could start from home also, okay? | |
| When my kids were young, they had homework to do and I would always ask them, Hey, you know how kids will be. | ||
| They'll tell you yes, and I'll say, Go get it and so I can look at it. | ||
| And something might be wrong with it, and I would tell them, Hey, you need to look at it again. | ||
| Okay, so I don't think it's all the teacher's obligation to see if the child should do their homework. | ||
| Another thing, now they're teaching kids to write in school, not cursive. | ||
| So they don't do that. | ||
| So I thought, well, how are you going to write a check or anything like that? | ||
| And history is very important, very important. | ||
| And I think that when kids act up in school the way some of them do now, I think they it should be the the fighting and everything. | ||
| I think that they should be put out of school for a couple of days or something, you know. | ||
| But they do not learn and listen in school. | ||
| They use calculators. | ||
| They don't learn how to add, um, you know, manually. | ||
| So they are using calculators even in probably the second or third grade on up, you know. |