July 28, 2025 01:01 PM UTC

Linda McMahon's Education Funding Bodyslam Averted, For Now

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• by: Colorado Pols

As 9NEWS’ Marshall Zelinger reports from this weekend’s meeting of the National Governors Association (NGA) meeting at the Phil Anschutz-owned Broadmoor international swank zone in Colorado Springs, there’s good news and bad news to report on the matter of millions of dollars in education funds recently frozen by the Trump administration, who questioned whether the money might be used for anything that wasn’t considered morally above board in the 1950s. The good news is:

Colorado will receive $66 million in education funding that the Trump administration froze earlier this month, part of $5 billion nationwide that was withheld for review before July 1 and has now been released to states.

But looking ahead, there’s no guarantee we won’t be doing the same thing next summer:

Democratic Gov. Jared Polis questioned Education Secretary Linda McMahon about the funding freeze during a National Governors Association (NGA) meeting at The Broadmoor in Colorado Springs on Friday, but received no assurances that similar disruptions won’t occur in the future…

During the discussion, Polis first thanked McMahon for releasing the frozen funds before pressing her on communication about future funding decisions.

“How can we better communication to make sure this chaos and uncertainty doesn’t occur again around funding, and that people know things earlier?” Polis asked McMahon during the session.

McMahon’s response offered little reassurance: “No guarantees from me that we’ll eliminate all the communication gaps.” [Pols emphasis]

That’s a hell of a thing to promise, or in Education Secretary Linda McMahon’s case to not promise, but it’s all we can probably expect from an Education Secretary put in office to oversee the Department’s dismantlement to the extent executive action allows. Much like McMahon’s high-drama cameos on WWE Raw, McMahon doesn’t come to blue states to make friends. Gov. Polis wasn’t happy with McMahon’s answers despite thanking her in the beginning for restoring the funding, and had this to say afterward when asked:

When asked why he thanked someone after holding money hostage, he compared it to his recent bridge project that was torpedoed by a public vote with 94% opposing.

“It’s like all the people you know thanking the governor for a bridge that he didn’t build that was his proposal. So, it’s actually very similar,” Polis said.

Polis is joking about his proposal for a pedestrian walkway in front of the Capitol that fell victim to negative publicity and was ultimately pulled by the governor himself after he submitted the question to an unscientific online poll that went over 90% against him. Just as it was in 2020 when Gov. Polis had to walk a fine line between criticism of the Trump administration and ensuring the state receives its share of federal funds, Polis has a practical if unsatisfying obligation to understate his criticism of the Trump 2.0 administration’s bad fiscal faith in order to keep whatever federal education money he can keep flowing coming in. This is sometimes wrongly interpreted as appeasement, but for an official in a position of responsibility it’s more like damage control.

It’s about not making Colorado kids suffer for Trump’s political whims.