Democrats seek to use spending bill to block Trump administration proposal to arm teachers

Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-CA, said in a statement on Thursday that she would “do everything in my power to block this policy – including through the appropriations process.” (The Associated Press)

Democrats on Capitol Hill are eyeing the spending bill currently on the Senate floor as a way to block the Trump administration’s reported plan to arm school teachers.

Following a report by the New York Times that the Education Department is weighing whether to allow states to use federal grants earmarked for academic enrichment to purchase guns for schools, Democrats in both the Senate and the House quickly raised concerns and vowed to block the reported plan.

Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-CA, said in a statement on Thursday that she would “do everything in my power to block this policy – including through the appropriations process.”

The Senate right now is considering a combination spending bill that would cover the Pentagon, Departments of Labor, Health and Human Services and Education. Senators could decide on this bill as early as Thursday, but it seems more likely that they will vote on it next week.

The funding stream the administration is currently using for arming teachers is only good through the end of the fiscal year, September 30. The current spending bill now up in the Senate would fund the government for the new fiscal year, starting October 1.

There is no concrete proposal yet from Feinstein and others to draft an amendment to the current bill that would bar the Department of Education from using congressionally-allocated funds to arm teachers. By the same token, there has so far been no move by Second Amendment supporters in the Senate to protect that money from such prohibitions.

If the combination bill passes through the Senate, in whatever form, it would still have to pass through the House and both chambers would then have to merge the Senate and House spending bills.

The response from Democrats in the House to arming teachers mirrored those of their colleagues in the Senate, with House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-CA, calling in a statement the Trump administration proposal “one of the most egregious, short-sighted and dangerous executive branch abuses of our education system in modern history.”

Pelosi added: “If the Trump Administration continues to pursue this shocking policy and refuses to uphold the integrity of the Every Student Succeeds Act, Congress must step in and take action to defend students and teachers from President Trump’s attacks.”

The New York Times, citing multiple people with knowledge of the plan, reported Wednesday evening that Education Secretary Betsy DeVos and her office were focusing on a federal education law that does not explicitly prohibit the purchase of firearms through federal funds called the Student Support and Academic Enrichment grants.

Liz Hall, a spokeswoman for the department, told the paper that the agency is “constantly considering and evaluating policy issues, particularly issues related to school safety,” but did not specifically address whether the department is considering granting states the option to use federal funds for weapons purchases.

“The secretary nor the department issues opinions on hypothetical scenarios,” the spokeswoman said.

Stricter gun control laws have been at the forefront of hotly debated topics in Washington since a gunman opened fire at a high school in Parkland, Florida, and killed 17 students and faculty members.

President Trump in February expressed his support for arming “gun adept teachers with military or special training experience,” as a way to prevent another “savage sicko” from causing mass causalities. But he also advocated for gun control measures, such as raising the minimum age to purchase a firearm to 21.

Chad Pergram and Benjamin Brown contributed reporting to this piece.