A U.S. Department of Education employee leaves the building with their belonging on March 20, 2025 in Washington, DC.
Win McNamee | Getty Images
The Trump administration on Wednesday lost a bid to lift a federal judge’s order temporarily blocking the U.S. Education Department from laying off about half of its more than 4,000 employees.
The administration had asked the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Boston to lift the preliminary injunction issued by a Massachusetts District Court judge that stayed the large “reduction in force” at the department announced by Education Secretary Linda McMahon in March.
A three-judge panel on that appeals court rejected that effort Wednesday in a 26-page decision.
The Trump administration could ask the Supreme Court to lift the order.
But if the injunction remains in place, the Education Department would be blocked from drastically cutting its workforce as lawsuits challenging the layoffs play out in the district court and appellate courts.
The lawsuits were filed by 21 states, five labor organizations, and two school districts that allege that the reduction in force violates the U.S. Constitution and the Administrative Procedure Act.
“What is at stake in this case, the District Court found, was whether a nearly half-century-old cabinet department would be permitted to carry out its statutorily assigned functions or prevented from doing so by a mass termination of employees aimed at implementing the effective closure of that department,” wrote Chief Judge David Barron in the appeals court’s decision.
“Given the extensive findings made by the District Court and the absence of any contrary evidence having been submitted by the appellants, we conclude that the appellants’ stay motion does not warrant our interfering with the ordinary course of appellate adjudication in the face of what the record indicates would be the apparent consequences of our doing so,” Barron wrote.
Democracy Forward, a legal advocacy group that is representing plaintiffs in the case challenging the Education Department’s layoffs, in a statement said, “We are deeply encouraged by the First Circuit’s decision today to maintain the block that is preventing the Trump-Vance administration from proceeding with its harmful efforts to dismantle the Department of Education while our case moves forward.”
“We will never stop fighting on behalf of all students and public schools and the protections, services, and resources they need to thrive,” the group said.
CNBC has requested comment from the Education Department.
