WASHINGTON – May 14 2025 – Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.) welcomed President Trump’s plan to return the issue of education to the states and argued that Louisiana provides a strong example of how states can improve education throughout the country in a speech on the U.S. Senate floor.
Key excerpts of the speech are below:
“I am not saying Louisiana’s scores are perfect. I am not saying that, but it is undeniable that we are on the right track. We are. We stayed open, for the most part, during the pandemic. We have trained our teachers. We have established standards. You can’t go to the fourth grade until you can read. We have implemented parental choice.”
. . .
“The key to Louisiana’s future is not the price of oil. It is not what the unemployment rate is. It is not who the senator is or who the governor is. It is education.
“The status quo in America isn’t working. We didn’t make it any better as a result of our behavior with respect to the pandemic, and we are behind, but we can catch up if we just do the right things. One of those things is returning education to the states.
“I hope we do dismantle the Department of Education. It is basically a conduit for money—except that money goes through the Department of Education and the 4,000 employees there, and they all put a condition on the money as if they knew what was best for each state. They don’t. We ought to dismantle the Department of Education and send that money directly to the states.”
Watch Kennedy’s speech here.
