Trump To Issue Orders On K-12 ‘indoctrination,’ School Choice And Campus Protests

President Donald Trump is expected to sign executive orders that direct federal agencies to “end indoctrination” in K-12 education, launch investigations into campus protests and enact a federal school choice initiative, according to White House documents obtained by POLITICO outlining the directives.

Trump is expected to sign the three orders as soon as Wednesday, two administration official said.

The president's latest orders pile atop an array of commands — many which flesh out a campaign education policy agenda infused with socially conservative politics — from the first days of his administration's second term in office.

Together the impending orders offer a clear outline of how Trump will continue to embrace heated cultural debates while pushing for fundamental changes to the U.S. education system.

K-12 schooling

Trump’s executive order on “Ending Radical Indoctrination in K-12 Schooling” would prohibit federal funding for schools that include what the administration describes as “gender ideology and critical race theory in the classroom.”

The order is expected to say the attorney general will work with state and local legal officials to “file actions against teachers and school officials who sexually exploit minors or practice medicine without a license through ‘social transition’ practices,” according to the White House.

Education Secretary nominee Linda McMahon and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth will be ordered to provide the president with a strategy to “end indoctrination” in elementary and high schools within 90 days of the order’s signing.

The order will also reinstate the 1776 Commission that Trump created during his first term in office to promote patriotic education and counter lessons that he says divide Americans on race and slavery.

School choice

The president is also expected to order the Education Department to issue guidance on how states can support K-12 scholarship programs with federal funding formulas, while further directing the agency to prioritize school choice in department discretionary grant programs that are now the subject of a massive spending review.

Other agencies would also get involved. Trump’s expected order would require the Department of Health and Human Services to issue guidance on how states can use block grant funds for children and families to support “educational alternatives, including private and faith-based educational options and nonprofits,” according to the White House summaries of Trump’s orders.

Hegseth would also be directed to submit a plan for how military families can use Defense Department funds to send children to schools that could fall outside of the agency’s own school system.

Interior Secretary nominee Doug Burgum would also be ordered to submit a plan on how families who rely on that agency’s Bureau of Indian Education schools can use federal funds to attend the school of their choice.

Antisemitism

The president’s coming executive order to combat antisemitism would take on the rise in antisemitic incidents on campuses following the Oct. 7 attack on Israel by Hamas.

The order would charge the Justice Department and attorney general with taking “immediate action” to prosecute antisemitic crimes like vandalism and intimidation as well as investigate “anti-Jewish racism in leftist, anti-American colleges and universities.” Additionally, the White House is promising to deport and revoke the student visas of those deemed sympathetic to Hamas.

The White House is also directing all federal agencies within 60 days of the order to review and report any criminal and civil authorities the agency has that can be used to address antisemitism.