One lawsuit has already been filed against President Donald Trump and his education secretary, Linda McMahon, as of Monday, just four days after the president signed an executive order directing McMahon to close down her department “to the maximum extent appropriate and permitted by law.” Another has been announced but not yet filed.

Both legal challenges, which will be filed on behalf of various civil rights and educational advocacy groups, argue that the president’s executive order and directions to close the department are yet another example of executive overreach. They add that even without Congress’s approval, the actions McMahon has already taken go against the department’s intended purpose of ensuring equal opportunity, allocating congressionally appropriated funding, enforcing civil rights laws, protecting students with disabilities, administering federal student aid programs and more.  

The first lawsuit was filed by Democracy Forward at the Federal District Court in Massachusetts. The second will soon be filed by Student Defense in Maryland. Both say Trump’s efforts could cause irreparable damage to the American public education system and harm millions of vulnerable students.

“Defendants’ steps since January 20, 2025, constitute a de facto dismantling of the Department by executive fiat,” the Student Defense complaint argues, according to a news release. “But the Constitution gives power over ‘the establishment of offices [and] the determination of their functions and jurisdiction’ to Congress—not to the President or any officer working under him.”

McMahon has repeatedly acknowledged that the executive branch can’t completely abolish the cabinet agency; that would require congressional action. But before the executive order was even signed, the secretary fired nearly half the department’s staff, which experts said could hinder the agency’s ability to fulfill its congressionally mandated rules. And then after signing the order, Trump said the department’s student loan portfolio would move “immediately” to the Small Business Administration. (Several Democratic-led states are challenging the mass layoffs.)

“This country needs to be focused on how to improve education and opportunities for all … Yet, instead of doing that, Donald Trump is taking a wrecking ball to our nation’s best values and our chance at a better future,” said Skye Perryman, president of Democracy Forward. “We are honored to represent students, educators, schools, and communities across the nation in court to stop this abuse of power.”