HHS Ready to Take Over Program Serving Special Needs Students, Child Nutrition: RFK Jr.

Some Department of Education responsibilities are being shifted to other agencies.

Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. in Washington on Feb. 21, 2025. Win McNamee/Getty Images

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is prepared to take over a program that serves students with special needs, as well as a program in charge of school meals, Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said on March 21.

HHS “is fully prepared to take on the responsibility of supporting individuals with special needs and overseeing nutrition programs that were run” by the Department of Education, Kennedy wrote on social media platform X.

“We are committed to ensuring every American has access to the resources they need to thrive. We will make the care of our most vulnerable citizens our highest national priority. Together, we will Make America Healthy Again.”

President Donald Trump on March 20 signed an order directing the education secretary to “take all necessary steps to facilitate the closure of the Department of Education.”

The order said the secretary shall, at the same time, ensure the uninterrupted delivery of crucial services and programs.

The president told reporters the following day that the processing of student loans would be shifted to the Small Business Administration, while HHS would take over “special needs and all of the nutrition programs and everything else.”

“I think that will work out very well,” Trump said. “Those two elements will be taken out of the Department of Education, and then all we have to do is get the students to get guidance from the people that love them and cherish them, including their parents by the way, who will be totally involved in their education along with boards and the governors and the states.”

The U.S. Department of Agriculture currently oversees school meals.

Under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, the Department of Education provides grants to schools to help teach disabled children. Some 6.6 million children in school met the act’s definition as of 2021, according to the most recent annual report on the implementation of the law. Some $15 billion was allocated in fiscal year 2024 alone under the act, according to the Congressional Research Service.

Education Secretary Linda McMahon said on Friday on Fox News that the Trump administration was focusing on which agencies could best administer work that had been done by the Department of Education.

“Some of the IDEA programs return to HHS, and that’s where they started. Title I funding was in place before there was a Department of Education. IDEA funding for our children with disabilities and special needs was in place before there was a Department of Education. And it managed to work incredibly well,” she said.

During her confirmation hearing, McMahon told a Senate panel that IDEA may be better served by HHS.

“It is of high priority to make sure that the students who are receiving disability funding that that is not impacted. It is incredibly important that those programs continue to be funded,” she said at the time.

Critics say the shift violates the law, which states in part that “there shall be, within the Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services in the Department of Education, an Office of Special Education Programs, which shall be the principal agency in the Department for administering and carrying out this chapter and other programs and activities concerning the education of children with disabilities.”

“This is a clear violation of education and appropriations law,” Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.) wrote on social media platform Bluesky.

Derek Black, a University of South Carolina law professor, said on X that moving special education from the Department of Education is illegal and unconstitutional.