| Sumario: | The Trump administration's ongoing effort to dismantle the US Department of Education marks the most significant federalism development in education policy in decades. Although framed as a return to local control, the restructuring relies on unilateral executive action that is fragmenting rather than devolving federal authority. Drawing on the historical evolution of federal power—from ESEA's emergence of a federal role, through the accountability politics of NCLB, to ESSA's approach to devolution—this article argues that meaningful decentralization requires institutional capacity, legal clarity, and intergovernmental coordination. The elimination of ED undermines each of these foundations. By subverting Congressional authority and simply reallocating responsibilities across multiple federal agencies while eliminating thousands of expert staff through executive authority, the administration simultaneously weakens federal oversight, increases administrative burdens on states, and accelerates partisan divergence in education policy. This case illustrates the limits of executive federalism as a tool of devolution: the federal role persists, but its institutional efficiency erodes, producing fragmentation that threatens equity, coherence, and stability of American education governance.
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