The GOP's Blueprint for Dominance: Dismantling Education to Defeat Democrats

 

By Santa Clarita Star Staff

05/25/2025 at 9:30 PM

 

Republicans are dismantling public schools to create a less educated electorate—slashing DEI funding, attacking teachers' unions, and pushing Project 2025’s radical agenda. The goal? Fewer college graduates, more GOP voters, and a nation where classrooms serve partisan interests over truth.

 

 

SANTA CLARITA — It's easy to think that what is unfolding on school boards across the country as merely a debate over pedagogy or funding, but what is really happening is a fierce struggle for the soul of America. The Republican Party is waging a multi-front war on education in America in order to stem the increase of college educated voters who tend to vote for Democrats and abolish teachers' unions, which often provide support and funding to Democratic candidates. Abolshing the Department of Education would allow states to strip civil rights protections for minorities and potentially redirect funding away from minority communities to wealthier white majority communities.

 

Recent judicial interventions, such as a federal judge's ruling to block President Donald Trump's executive order aimed at dismantling the U.S. Department of Education, underscore the high stakes. U.S. District Judge Myong Joun determined the administration's plan to slash department staff by nearly half—from over 4,100 to under 2,200—was not a mere "reorganization" but an unlawful attempt to neuter a federal agency without Congressional consent, emphasizing that "A department without enough employees to perform statutorily mandated functions is not a department at all." This legal skirmish, however, is but a flashpoint in a broader, more calculated campaign that has a more cynical political aim: weakening the Democratic Party by targeting institutions and demographics that tend to vote for and give money to Democratic candidates.

 

The intensity of this battle reflects a significant and widening partisan divergence linked to wether or not you went to college. Over the past decade, college graduates have increasingly identified with the Democratic Party, while those without a four-year degree have become more likely to support Republican candidates. In the 2022 midterm elections, for example, 51% of Democratic voters held college degrees, compared to only 37% of Republican voters. Consequently, a striking 63% of Republican voters did not possess a college degree. Exit polls from the 2024 presidential election painted an even starker picture: college graduates favored Vice President Kamala Harris over Donald Trump by 55% to 42%, while Trump commanded a 56% to 42% lead among voters without a degree. This represents a notable departure from less than a decade prior when college-educated voters were more evenly divided. By April 2024, Pew Research confirmed the Democratic Party's 13-percentage-point advantage among college graduates (55% vs. 42%), while the GOP led by six percentage points (51% to 45%) among those without a degree. This educational polarization, a relatively recent phenomenon, has grown wider since 2017 than at any point in Pew Research surveys dating back to the 1990s.

This demographic shift is particularly pronounced among white voters. While white college-educated voters showed a 7-percentage-point preference for Harris over Trump in 2024, a mere 32% of white non-college-educated voters supported Harris, with 66% backing Trump. As a key demographic—college-educated individuals, particularly white college graduates who historically leaned Republican —trends away, the Republican Party's increasingly critical posture towards higher education may be less a cause of this electoral gap and more a strategic reaction to it. In 2016, when then-candidate Donald Trump declared, "I love the poorly educated," he showed that he was aware of this electoral reality. While the Conservatives have been against public education and teacher's unions for decades, the GOP sharpened its rhetoric in what appears to be a strategy to resonate with non-college educated voters, frequently framing higher education as an "elite" and "woke".

 

The Ivory Tower as an Ideological Battleground

Republican critiques are multi-faceted, intending to strike America's public education system on multiple fronts. This extends from concerns about ideological "indoctrination" to the content of curricula and campus culture. The assertion that colleges are bastions of left-wing thought where students are "brainwashed" is a recurring theme. Some conservative academics report feeling pressure from colleagues and students, particularly since around 2014, due to perceived progressive overrepresentation and the use of institutional procedures to address alleged "harm" or "bias" in ways that can stifle dissent.

 

Specific curricular content, notably around race and gender, has become a major flashpoint. The 2024 Republican Party platform, for example, called for cutting federal funding to schools allegedly teaching Critical Race Theory (CRT) and "radical gender ideology." This echoed what was proposed in Project 2025, a comprehensive policy blueprint for the second Trump administration spearheaded by the Heritage Foundation. The term "CRT", the actual theory largely taught in law school, became a catch-all term to describe any education about non-white history and culture. Activist Christopher Rufo has been influential in this sphere, aiming to associate CRT with "something crazy" in the public mind and critiquing what he terms "gender ideology" as an attempt to "re-engineer society." These concerns are amplified by political figures warning against the "sexualization" of children or schools "transitioning" students without parental consent.

 

Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) initiatives have also drawn significant Republican fire. The Trump administration, for instance, took a strong stance against universities over their diversity programs and their handling of pro-Palestine protests, often citing concerns about antisemitism. This led to calls for government action against DEI programs. In January 2025, soon after taking office, Pres. Trump signed an executive order banning all federal spending on DEI programs, including funding for colleges and universities that promoted DEI.

 

"It means no more funding for illegal DEI programs," Trump's Press Secretary Karoline Levitte declared at a press briefing on January 29, 2025. "It means no more funding for the Green New Scam that has cost American taxpayers tens of billions of dollars. It means no more funding for transgenderism and wokeness across our federal bureaucracy and agencies."

That executive order was followed by two more executive orders. One which definined “sex” as an individual's “immutable biological classification as either male or female,” intending to directly impact how universities address gender identity and potentially rolling back protections for LGBTQIA+ students and staff. The other executive order requires executive departments and agencies to terminate “all discriminatory and illegal preferences, mandates, policies, programs, activities, guidance, regulations, enforcement actions, consent orders and requirements.”

 

All three of these executive orders are intended to use federal funding to serve as tools to force universities to regulate speech and opinions to more closely align with the administration. This would potentially leading to significant changes in university operations, policies, and campus climate.

 

These executive orders have already had tangible consequences, forcing instituitons of higher education to decide whether they would fight the executive orders in court or copitualate to the demands of the Trump administration. Columbia University quickly chose the latter path. The Trump administration threatened Columbia University with a $400 million cut in federal funding, claiming that it failed to address antisemitism in the wake of protests over Gaza. This cut in funding would lead to staff layoffs and a scaling back of vital scientific research. To restore funding, Columbia agreed to implement significant overhauls, including revising its student disciplinary process and placing its Middle Eastern studies program under the supervision of government minders to regulate speech and opinions. While instances of antisemitism and speech suppression are serious, the political discourse surrounding them can be strategically employed, potentially chilling legitimate academic discourse if universities become overly cautious to avoid federal scrutiny.

 

Financial aspects also feature prominently. The Trump administration's opposition to widespread student debt relief, and conservative proposals from think tanks like the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) to make federal subsidies contingent on demonstrable returns on investment, signal a push to force public colleges and universities from being a public service to competing in the free market. AEI further advocates for overturning federal restrictions on a comprehensive student unit record data system to better track outcomes and for streamlining student loan programs, even suggesting the elimination of federal graduate student loans. These critiques and actions, including direct punitive measures against institutions like Harvard University—which is currently facing grant cuts and a federal ban on enrolling foreign students over its DEI policies —suggest a comprehensive strategy to challenge the current state and perceived ideological bent of higher education. Making college unaffordable means many young people in America will be unable to go to college, which also means more non-college educated voters in the future.

 

The Union Question: Political Power and Policy Obstruction

Teachers' unions represent another critical front in this ideological and political war. Republicans have long viewed them as powerful entities that stymie reform, protect underperforming teachers, and, crucially, serve as formidable political allies and financial engines for the Democratic Party. The Manhattan Institute, a conservative think tank, argues that the U.S. Department of Education itself was established at the behest of teachers' unions and primarily serves their agenda of "more spending and less accountability." The core of the Republican critique lies in the unions' substantial political alignment with Democrats. As one analysis puts it, "Unions also are skewed toward Democrats, so killing unions hurts the Democrats."

 

Financial data from OpenSecrets starkly illustrates this alignment. From 1990 to 2024, teachers' unions directed approximately $41.1 million to Democratic U.S. House candidates compared to just $1.6 million for Republicans. For Senate candidates, the disparity was $5.7 million for Democrats versus $0.2 million for Republicans. In the 2023-2024 cycle alone, teachers' unions contributed roughly $47.2 million, overwhelmingly to Democrats and liberal groups. The National Education Association (NEA) contributed about $3.2 million to Democratic candidates and parties versus about $52,000 to Republicans, with the vast majority of its $29 million in outside spending also supporting liberal groups. The American Federation of Teachers (AFT) directed approximately $2.8 million to Democratic candidates and parties, with no comparable contributions to Republicans, and its $4.3 million in outside spending similarly favored liberal groups.

 

This political and financial muscle makes teachers' unions a prime target. State-level efforts to curtail their power are illustrative. In Florida, a law now requires public sector unions, notably targeting teachers' unions, to maintain at least 60% membership to avoid decertification—a threshold from which unions representing police officers and firefighters, groups often leaning Republican, are exempt. Decertification means losing the ability to collectively bargain for pay and benefits. In Utah, a bill advanced to ban collective bargaining for all public sector employees, including teachers, with proponents arguing it allows for more direct employer-employee engagement. Union leaders decry these as "union-busting" tactics designed to silence critics and erode worker protections. Such measures, by diminishing union strength, serve a dual strategic purpose for the GOP: reducing a key source of funding and organizational support for their political adversaries while removing a major impediment to conservative education reforms like school choice. This selective targeting suggests the GOP's stance is driven more by political alignment than a blanket opposition to organized labor, attempting to fracture labor solidarity by differentiating between unions perceived as allies and those seen as integral to the Democratic coalition.

 

Remaking K-12: From Federal Control to Localized Campaigns

The conservative vision for K-12 education involves a significant rollback of federal influence and a reshaping of curriculum and school governance from the ground up. The Trump administration's stated goal was to close the Department of Education, transferring authority to states and families. Project 2025 provides a detailed playbook for this, proposing to reduce the DoE to a mere "statistics-gathering agency" (while also prohibiting the collection of demographic data vital for equity ), eliminating programs like Head Start (serving over 800,000 low-income children ) and Title I (providing $18.4 billion to high-poverty schools ), rescinding civil rights protections for LGBTQ+ students, and promoting universal private school choice. The justification—that federal spending hasn't improved test scores and that the Biden DoE imposed costly regulations and promoted "radical ideologies" —often appears intertwined with a "white Christian nationalist agenda" aimed at controlling curriculum content around gender, race, and history. Ironically, some proposals like a federal "Parents' Bill of Rights" would necessitate new federal oversight, suggesting a repurposing, not just a reduction, of federal power towards ideological enforcement.

 

This agenda is powerfully amplified by the "parental rights" movement, a socially conservative political force seeking to restrict school teachings on gender, sexuality, and race without explicit parental consent. Groups like Moms for Liberty (M4L), founded in 2021 by former Florida school board members, have become its public face. Initially opposing COVID mandates, M4L rapidly expanded, claiming 70,000 members by late 2021 by campaigning against "woke indoctrination," promoting book bans, and attacking LGBTQ+ rights. M4L leadership has referred to teachers' unions as "terrorist organizations" and advocates for eliminating the Department of Education. Despite a "grassroots" image, M4L receives substantial funding from conservative nonprofits, including the Heritage Foundation and the Publix heiress's George Jenkins Foundation, and has close ties to prominent Republicans like Governor Ron DeSantis and Donald Trump. The Southern Poverty Law Center has designated M4L an "anti-government extremist group," noting its inflammatory rhetoric, such as using the term "groomer" for those who support gender and sex education for children. This rhetoric aims to create moral panic and bypass nuanced discussion, mobilizing parents around perceived threats.

 

The Heritage Foundation provides the intellectual architecture, spearheading Project 2025 and disseminating policy resources. This synergy between think tank policy development and activist mobilization creates a formidable force. The "parental rights" banner, echoing historical battles over curriculum during periods of social anxiety like the Scopes Trial or resistance to integration, is used to advance this agenda. This movement is credited with bringing new voters to the Republican party, leveraging concerns about schools to build a broader political base. Local school boards have become a key battleground. In California's Santa Clarita Valley, for instance, M4L-associated PTA members removed books with LGBTQ+ themes from an elementary school book fair in 2024. The local M4L chapter openly advocated for book bans and policies to "out" LGBTQ+ children, contrasting with leadership claims of not believing in censorship. Karen Frost, the chair of the Los Angeles County M4L, actively supported conservative school board candidates in the 2024 elections, which resulted in what Frost called a "supermajority" of right-wing Republicans on the William S. Hart High School District Board of Directors.

 

The Legal and Constitutional Battlefronts

The "war on education" is also waged in courtrooms. The Oklahoma religious charter school case tested the separation of church and state. St. Isidore of Seville Catholic Virtual Charter School sought public funding while asserting the right to impose Catholic doctrine and discriminate based on religion and LGBTQ+ status. The Catholic Conference of Oklahoma explicitly aimed to create a test case. In June 2024, the Oklahoma Supreme Court ruled this unconstitutional. On May 22, 2025, the U.S. Supreme Court, with Justice Barrett recused, issued a 4-4 tie. This affirmed the Oklahoma ruling but also did not set any binding nationwide precedent. This leaves the door open for similar challenges, highlighting deep judicial divisions on the Establishment Clause.

 

Policies affecting foreign students also reveal the administration's approach. The Trump administration attempted to revoke Harvard University's certification to enroll its over 6,700 foreign students (27% of its student body), a move Harvard called retaliatory for its DEI policies and refusal to alter hiring practices. DHS head Kristi Noem framed this as a "warning," stating that enrolling foreign students was a "privilege, not a right." Such actions, including visa revocations and a policy threatening deportation for students whose schools went fully online during the pandemic, contributed to a 12% decline in new international enrollment during the first Trump term. International students contribute massively to the U.S. economy ($43.8 billion and over 378,000 jobs in 2023-24 ) and are vital for STEM programs. Deterring them threatens U.S. innovation and soft power, as countries like France and Japan actively recruit this talent. The "chilling effect" of such policies also undermines academic freedom for these students. If Harvard lost the money brought in from international students, it would also mean that many poorer American students would not be able to afford to attend the university.

 

In local communities, federal policy shifts have direct impacts. On April 7, 2025, DHS agents attempted to enter two LAUSD elementary schools to access students claimed to be undocumented, just months after President Trump rescinded a policy designating schools as "sensitive locations" exempt from such enforcement. This action sent "fear through Los Angeles County's immigrant communities," signaling that "no space was truly safe anymore" and blurring lines between border policy and community life.

 

The End Game: Education as a Political Weapon

The Republican Party's multifaceted engagement with education—from critiques of "wokeness" on campus to the push for "parental rights" in K-12, from targeting teachers' unions to attempting to dismantle the federal Department of Education—is more than a series of disconnected policy disputes. It appears to be a coherent, if complex, strategy to use religious and ideological conviction to weaken key support structures in the Democratic Party. The shifting allegiance of college-educated voters provides a demographic impetus, while the robust financial and political backing teachers' unions offer Democrats makes them a clear target.

 

Actions taken often serve multiple purposes: energizing the base, challenging political adversaries, and attempting to reshape influential institutions to align with conservative priorities. The "war on education" is thus not merely about what children learn or how universities are run; it is a critical front in a larger battle for political power and cultural definition in America. The long-term consequences of transforming classrooms into contested political territory and educational attainment into a stronger partisan marker could be profound, affecting not only the quality and equity of education but also the health of democratic discourse and societal cohesion for generations to come.