Proposed education spending hike faces resistance in Senate

WASHINGTON – President Joe Biden’s proposed historic increases in education spending ran into headwinds at a Senate Appropriations subcommittee hearing Wednesday, including apparent opposition to tuition-free college from Democratic Sen.

Joe Manchin III of West Virginia.

Manchin, who has already shown his power in the 50-50 Senate to scale back or derail administration initiative, told Education Secretary Miguel Cardona that free tuition for the first two years might not help students get through college and instead suggested making student loans for that period forgivable.

“Let them earn it. Don’t give it on the front end. Let them earn it on the back end,” Manchin said.

Cardona tried to sell a proposed 40% increase in education spending, to $102.8 billion next fiscal year, as well as programs from the administration’s infrastructure and jobs proposals. He argued the increased investments would help close long-term equity gaps in education as well as help recovery from learning losses caused by the coronavirus pandemic.

“With the budget proposal, the American Families Plan is a transformational opportunity for our country, to not only recover from the pandemic, but to be better than we ever were before in education,” Cardona told members of the Labor-hhsEducation Appropriations Subcommittee.

The lion’s share of the department budget would go toward a $20 billion increase in the Title I program, which provides a sliding scale of funding programs for schools based on their percentage of low-income students. However, the budget also includes elements from the administration’s infrastructure and economic development proposals, such as making the first two years of community college free.

Manchin, whose state backed Donald Trump over Biden by nearly 39 percentage points in November, has emerged as a key impediment to plans to “go big” on spending for infrastructure and other programs, including the $1.8 trillion American Families Plan that includes not only expanded education programs, but also more affordable child care, paid family and medical leave for workers, and an extension of an expanded child tax credit.

Manchin’s opposition in Wednesday’s hearing could be enough to scuttle free college, a promise Biden – whose wife is a community college teacher – made on the campaign trail and has touted in speeches this spring. It comes as Democrats are preparing a budget resolution that would allow them to pass a spending package later this year without Republican support, but only if all Democrats are united.

The Senate filibuster prevents Biden from passing a spending plan without significant Republican support, and Democrats have sought for months to woo Manchin’s backing for an infrastructure bill that can proceed without it.

Sen. Roy Blunt, R-MO., pushed back against the proposed spending increases, especially because much of the aid already allocated to schools earlier in the pandemic has not been spent. He said Education Department documents showed schools spent about $9 billion of the more than $190 billion distributed so far from various COVID-19 recovery bills.