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Michigan’s top education leader is urging the Trump administration to release nearly $7 billion in funding the federal government is withholding from schools nationwide.
In Michigan, that includes nearly $160 million.
The funding, approved by Congress earlier this year as part of a continuing budget resolution signed by President Donald Trump in March, was supposed to be distributed Tuesday. But the Trump administration said Monday it would not release the funds, Chalkbeat reported.
“These federal dollars support some of our most economically disadvantaged and vulnerable students,” Michigan State Superintendent Michael Rice said in a statement Wednesday. “The U.S. Department of Education should provide the approved funding immediately.”
The money funds programs that support migrant education ($5.4 million), services for English learners ($12.8 million), staff professional development ($63.7 million), before- and after-school programs ($36.7 million), and academic enrichment ($38.3 million), Rice said.
Rice said that based on past practice, “local school districts were rightly counting on this approved funding by July 1.”
He said the Michigan Department of Education, which he oversees, “is working with colleagues across the country and with legal counsel to reflect upon the adverse impact to students, staff, and schools of this withholding.”
It was unclear Wednesday afternoon if the department is considering legal action.
A spokesperson for the White House Office of Management and Budget, said Wednesday that the move to withhold the funding was part of an ongoing programmatic review of education funding, and that no decisions had been made yet.
Initial findings, the spokesperson said, “have shown that many of these grant programs have been grossly misused to subsidize a radical leftwing agenda.”
Chalkbeat senior national reporter Kalyn Belsha contributed to this report.
Lori Higgins is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Detroit. You can reach her at lhiggins@chalkbeat.org.
