Denver, Co. — Colorado U.S. Senator Michael Bennet, former superintendent of Denver Public Schools, released the following statement in response to President Trump’s executive order dismantling the U.S. Department of Education:
“Parents are worried enough about the state of America’s public education system. Our children were having a tough time before the pandemic, and things have become more difficult since. Reading scores have hit a twenty-year low, and chronic absenteeism is on the rise. All of this is proof we need to work together to reimagine our public schools for the 21st century, not bring a wrecking ball to them.
But the answer was not to tap a former wrestling executive as the nation’s Secretary of Education. The children who will suffer the most from President Trump and Elon Musk’s outrageous decision are America’s most vulnerable — children living in poverty, children with disabilities, and children in rural communities.
We would be far better off working with every American family to deliver high-quality early childhood education, building modern schools to prepare every high school graduate to earn a good living, and making our higher education system affordable for those who want to go to college.”