La. Gov. Landry to Newsmax: Trump, McMahon 'Trying to Cut Out the Middleman' in Education

Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry told Newsmax on Monday he's fully on board with President Donald Trump's directive to shut down the Education Department, saying the president and Education Secretary Linda McMahon are "trying to cut out the middleman" of the Washington bureaucracy.

The Republican governor said Trump appointed McMahon to "dismantle the Department of Education because Americans are tired of continuing to fail while they send more of their treasure to Washington, and Washington spends it and we're not getting the results out there."

"Look, the president understands that the most important voice in a child's education are parents and the most important person in that child's education are teachers," Landry said on "Wake Up America." "And when you focus on those two sets of people, you get a great outcome."

Asked if he shares the concerns of Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, a Democrat, that the Education Department's shuttering will have devastating consequences for students, Landry said, "Absolutely not, not based upon the promises that have been made to us by the president."

He added: "He keeps his promises a lot better than the Democrats do, and I would tell my good friend to point out to me how the current system is helping achieve good educational scores for American children around the country. We continue to be last while we pour more money into the system through Washington.

"Look, if you're going to send the money up here and you're going to send it back down to the states, at least give us more and quit keeping it up here in the bureaucracy.

"That's what Secretary McMahon and the president are trying to do: They're trying to cut out the middleman, which is the bureaucracy here in Washington. I've spoken to fellow Democrat governors. They don't have a problem sending the money to them and giving them the flexibility. Look, this is about stopping the president from achieving what Americans want — flexibility, common sense and actual solutions."

Mainstream media outlets raising the alarm about how poorly teachers and classrooms will fare with fewer bureaucrats in Washington are doing so "because the math that they're not doing is the math that says look at the ratio of bureaucrats versus actual teachers," Landry said.

"See where the money is actually going," he said. "I can tell you, Cade Brumley, who's our superintendent of education, who is really primarily responsible for the great achievements that we're making here in Louisiana, if he believed that our rural students were at risk, he would be ringing my phone and he's not. What he's doing is saying, Hey, let's continue to work with our Legislature to put in place the great educational reforms we worked on last year. Improve on those, and we can show the country how Louisiana students can shine."

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