
Not only is Trump’s Secretary of Education terrible at her job — she isn’t even doing it much of the time.

By far, Donald Trump’s least popular Cabinet member is Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos, a billionaire GOP megadonor who had absolutely no qualifications for the job.

In her short tenure of office, DeVos has dismantled protections for campus rape survivors, rolled back support for students with disabilities, and gutted relief programs for victims of for-profit student loan scams.

However, while not rolling back important civil rights policies, it seems that what DeVos enjoys doing most in her day-to-day duties is ... absolutely nothing.


A FOIA request and subsequent report by the watchdog group American Oversight, aptly titled “Unexcused Absences,” revealed some startling numbers on how often DeVos simply doesn’t show up for work:

An analysis by American Oversight found that during that period — which stretches from February 8th to July 19th — DeVos only completed a full day of work 67% of the time.

The report found that over those five and a half months, DeVos took 15 days off, 21 half days off, and 11 long weekends — during a time period that included 113 federally mandated work days.

This ties in with other reports that DeVos is unsatisfied with her job and did not realize the Secretary of Education has such a limited role in how public schools are run.

A theocratic religious activist, DeVos had hoped to, in her own words, “advance God’s Kingdom” in American schools — presumably by privatizing school systems and directing federal funds to parochial institutions. Unfortunately for her, the federal government accounts for only 13 percent of school funding — most of the money is raised at the state and local level. So her pet ambition was thwarted.

Nevertheless, the fact that DeVos is so completely disengaged from her job — when millions of teachers across the country are worked to the bone, underpaid and subject to enormous expectations — is a slap in the face to educators and parents alike.

It is time that DeVos stepped aside and let someone who earnestly cares about and understands education take over. The well-being of students is at stake.