In a move to reduce the epidemic of teacher sexual misconduct, the Trump Administration has launched a nationwide crackdown on school districts that enable these disturbing offenses against children that continue to generate weekly headlines, Breitbart News has learned.
This week alone, three cases made the news:
- New Jersey special education teacher, 45, a married mother of two, was sentenced to 12 years in prison for having sex with an 8th grader.
- A 34-year-old Riverside, California teacher and swim coach pled guilty to two counts of sexual penetration and other sex crimes on a 14-year-old child.
- And, a 26-year-old teacher in the tiny eastern Washington town of Warden was sentenced to 15 years for repeated sex with a 13-year-old and filming the encounters.
The new effort appears particularly focused on what is known as “passing the trash” — the act of concealing sexual offenses and assigning the teacher to another school or recommending him or her as a good hire in another district.
The Department of Education (ED), which is leading the new probe, said in a recent statement:
The Trump Administration has observed a troubling and recurring pattern in schools across the nation of credible reports of sexual abuse and harassment by adults in positions of authority going uninvestigated or of suspected offenders being transferred to new schools or roles in the district.
However, that announcement, like many of Trump’s official actions, was ignored by major news networks and legacy print media.
While incessant Trump critics have accused the president of narrowing investigations and outright killing the federal education department, his administration in fact ramped up “educational sexual misconduct” reporting near the end of his first term.
The new policy meant to get a better handle on the problem had to overcome a court challenge to the reporting rules by the American Civil Liberties Union.
Announcement of the new 2026 crackdown comes following a blistering “Dear Colleague” letter sent out to U.S. school districts by ED Secretary Linda McMahon last month, which has been obtained by Breitbart News.
McMahon cites the epidemic being enabled by “institutional silence and complacency” by school districts and teachers’ unions being committed “to shield their members from disciplinary actions.”
McMahon called such practices a failure of their “moral and legal responsibilities to parents and students.”
Two decades-old laws are in play in the effort, an ED source who asked for anonymity told Breitbart News:
- A Title IX amendment in 1972 which requires schools with “knowledge of sexual harassment or sexual assault” to “promptly respond in a manner that is not deliberately indifferent.”
- The Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) requires local districts receiving federal funds to prohibit schools from quietly removing perpetrators by helping them get jobs at other institutions — the practice known as “passing the trash,” the source said.
Secretary McMahon in her letter promised those who fail to follow federal laws will face the loss of federal funding, which virtually all school districts depend on for various local programs.
“This epidemic of nationwide sexual abuse in our schools must end,” she concluded.
In short, though schools are largely controlled by local school boards, the Trump administration and ED appear to be on the warpath.
Hellbound and Down 