(NewsNation) — Linda McMahon will go in front of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions to seek approval to lead the Department of Education — which President Donald Trump has said he wants to abolish.
Closing the Department of Education is an issue Trump campaigned on in the 2024 Election, and he has said it was infiltrated by “radicals, zealots and Marxists.”
“I told Linda, ‘Linda, I hope you do a great job and put yourself out of a job,’” Trump previously said, adding he would like to end the department through executive order, NewsNation partner The Hill writes.
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The Department of Education sends billions of dollars a year to schools, manages a $1.6 trillion student loan portfolio and enforces civil rights in education. It would also require an act of Congress to shut down the department.
Democratic Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Andy Kim said in a letter to McMahon this week that she’ll be asked if she supports Trump’s plans, and what she will do to carry them out, The Associated Press reported. According to the AP, this letter asks McMahon to commit to preserving the department’s student loan operations and civil rights office, among other programs. It also mentions her lack of experience in the education sphere.
Formerly the CEO of World Wrestling Entertainment, McMahon is also likely to face questions over a lawsuit stating that she and her husband, Vince, ignored rampant abuse of so-called “ring boys” by ringside announcer Melvin Phillips Jr. in the 1980s and 1990s.
The alleged assaults were sexual in nature, the suit alleges.
McMahon previously was the head of the Small Business Administration during Trump’s first term.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
