Education Secretary Linda McMahon claimed on Tuesday that she’s trying to rebuild and expand the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights (OCR), even as the administration pushes for tens of millions in funding cuts this year.

The Trump administration cut half of OCR’s staff and nationwide offices at the outset of President Donald Trump’s second term, eliciting strong condemnation from many Jewish community groups. OCR is the primary agency responsible for investigating and adjudicating complaints of antisemitism on college campuses. 

The administration has continued to push for further budget cuts to OCR and is more broadly attempting to dismantle the Department of Education and transfer some of its functions to other federal agencies.

At a Senate Appropriations subcommittee hearing, McMahon largely brushed off responsibility for the initial force reduction, claiming that the process to carry out the firings had been initiated before she was confirmed for her post and carried out shortly after she was sworn in, blaming “very stringent budgetary requirements that we were given.”

“We were in the process of looking at how to make sure that our Office of Civil Rights was in fact going to be able to handle cases, trying to make sure that we could get as many of them as possible,” McMahon said.

McMahon further claimed that the 2027 budget submitted by the Trump administration contains more funding to hire lawyers at OCR. The budget, in fact, requests a $49 million cut, from $140 million in 2026 to $91 million in 2027.

“It is a budget of increasing dollars for civil rights,” McMahon said, refusing to acknowledge, under questioning by Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT), that the budget submitted by the Trump administration called for a 35% cut to the OCR budget, to Murphy’s bewilderment.

“We are bringing back lawyers, we are hiring lawyers, with the person who has been so successful before in getting this done … we’re addressing [the case backlog] for rapid mediation, expanded resolution and multi-regional teams that we have now put back in place. Addressing the issues in the past were inadequate,” McMahon said.

McMahon was referring to Kim Richey, now the assistant secretary for civil rights, who has served in previous Republican administrations as well. McMahon praised her as highly “effective.” She also claimed to have re-hired all of the OCR attorneys who were fired, except those who took early retirement.

“It’s like black is white, it’s a 35% cut you’re proposing,” Murphy interjected.

Pressed by Murphy on the sweeping firings at the outset of the Trump administration, McMahon said, “That is hindsight.”

Pressed further, McMahon responded, “You know perfectly well what it is. We’ve brought people on board to handle these cases because I believe they should be handled. We should be dismissing these cases, we should be finding resolutions to them.”

In a detailed budget appendix submitted to Congress, the Trump administration also called for $274.5 million in funding for the Nonprofit Security Grant Program, flat funding with 2024 and 2025 but a cut from the proposed — but still not approved — $300 million expected for 2026.

Jewish groups and supporters of the program in Congress are pushing for between $750 million and $1 billion for the program.