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By the time President Trump put his pen to an executive order to abolish the Department of Education Thursday afternoon, a good deal of the difficult work had already been done.

Last week, Education Secretary Linda McMahon laid off over 1,300 staff members, shrinking the department to half the size it was when Trump took office. The action gutted the Office for Civil Rights, and left the National Center for Education Statistics, which oversees the Nation’s Report Card, with just three employees. 

The president’s move, rumoured for over a month and the subject of multiple leaked drafts, was largely ceremonial. While multiple polls show most Americans oppose the idea, Trump touted the plan as one with bipartisan support.

“It’s been amazing how popular this has been,” Trump said during the White House event, where he was joined by parents and children, several governors and members of Congress. “People have wanted to do this for many, many years… No president ever got around to doing it, but I’m getting around to doing it.”

Republicans celebrated the event as a chance to eliminate what Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis called a “cumbersome bureaucracy.” 

But behind the scenes, GOP governors are clamoring for their next prize: winning greater flexibility to spend federal dollars with fewer strings attached. DeSantis, Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee, and Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds all wrote op-eds this week promoting the idea of merging Title I and other education programs into a single block grant.

“I’m proud to say that Iowa is the first state in the nation to submit a comprehensive plan to the Department of Education to turn this concept into reality,” Reynolds wrote. 

In his brief comments Thursday, Trump promised to protect funding for Pell Grants, Title I and the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. In a statement, Education Secretary Linda McMahon also sought to reassure the public that “closing the department does not mean cutting off funds from those who depend on them.”

For Republican governors, having greater say over how those funds are spent would deliver on Trump’s promise of sending education “back to the states.”

The question is how hard Trump will push to change the way federal funds are distributed. The complicated funding formulas are written into law. Just as eliminating the department requires Congressional approval, so would changing the way the federal government funds education. Any effort to go around Congress would certainly prompt a lawsuit. 

“We literally have plaintiffs standing by,” said Keri Rodrigues, president of the National Parents Union.

That threat is unlikely to deter an administration that has already proven itself willing to push the envelope of what the law allows, said Alex Spurrier, an associate partner at Bellwether, an education think tank. 

“There’s not a clear mechanism for the secretary of education to … establish block grants for all the major federal education aid programs, but it doesn’t mean that the administration won’t attempt to do something,” he said. “Whatever moves they make on that front would probably be a legal gray area at best.”

In fact, most of Trump’s major actions to roll back the federal role in education have met with court challenges:

• Twenty states and the District of Columbia, led by Massachusetts, have sued over the mass layoffs, calling them unconstitutional. The lawsuit asks a federal judge to block Trump’s efforts to dismantle the department.

• The administration tried to cancel 70 contracts for teacher and principal preparation. On Monday a federal judge ordered the programs reinstated. 

• Another lawsuit against McMahon and the department focuses specifically on the cuts to the Office for Civil Rights. Filed by parents and advocates, the complaint calls on a judge to force the department to maintain staff needed to process complaints “promptly and equitably.” 

The idea of combining federal education funds into a block grant isn’t new. Republicans have long pushed to get them in a lump sum. 

“I would love to see the consolidation of the funding,” Indiana Education Secretary Katie Jenner, one of 12 state education chiefs who asked McMahon to prioritize such legislation. “I would also love if they gave us the opportunity to better determine the formula.”

A block grant, she said, would allow her to redirect funds toward programs that “we know are working.” She pointed to an initiative to train K-3 teachers in the science of reading as one example.

But Democrats and advocates say a block grant would defeat the purpose of Title I, which is to provide support for the most disadvantaged students. The $18 billion program — the largest within the Every Student Succeeds Act — provides funding for extra teachers, summer and afterschool programs and early-childhood education.

“Those funds are concentrated on districts with high numbers and high percentages of kids in poverty,” said Charles Barone, director of the Center for Innovation at the National Parents Union, an advocacy organization. A former Democratic House staffer, he said the strict formula for passing the funds down to states and districts was the most “contentious” issue in the House when Congress passed No Child Left Behind. “That’s been like a conservative holy grail as far back as I can remember.”

Trump acknowledged during the event that he can’t completely do away with the agency without Congress’s help. A bill would require 60 votes in the Senate, meaning it would need all Republicans and seven Democrats to pass.

“Everybody knows it’s right and the Democrats know it’s right,” he said. “I hope they’re going to be voting for it, because ultimately [it] may come before them.”

But so far Democrats haven’t proven willing to consider the plan. Sen. Patty Murray of Washington and fellow Democrats sent McMahon a letter Monday asking how she’ll ensure officials perform their core duties, like monitoring states’ compliance with federal education laws and processing financial aid forms, with half the staff. She said Trump’s executive order won’t do anything to improve student performance.

“We should be focused on helping our kids with math and reading — the basics they need to succeed,” she said in a statement. “Absolutely no one is asking for three out-of-touch billionaires to rip apart the Department of Education over some deranged far-right culture war.” 

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