President-elect Donald Trump has tapped Linda McMahon, a former wrestling executive with no experience as an educator, to lead the Department of Education.
A 76-year-old billionaire and co-founder of World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE), McMahon is a longtime friend of Trump and was made the chair of his transition team in August after she donated over $800,000 to his campaign.
During Trump’s first term, McMahon served as the administrator of the Small Business Administration from 2017-2019 before resigning to aid with Trump’s re-election campaign, serving as the chairwoman of the super PAC America First Action.
The Department of Education has long been a focal point for Trump’s war on “wokeness,” the president-elect and his allies depicting schools as a political battleground hijacked by the left. Throughout his campaign, Trump promised to cut funding to any school that teaches critical race theory or “transgender insanity,” as well as schools with vaccine or mask requirements.
Trump has also repeatedly vowed to shutter the Department of Education all together, though he has not explained how he would do so. The move would likely require congressional authorization.
“As Secretary of Education, Linda will fight tirelessly to expand ‘Choice’ to every State in America, and empower parents to make the best Education decisions for their families. … We will send Education BACK TO THE STATES, and Linda will spearhead that effort,” Trump wrote on social media.
Educators are reeling at McMahon’s appointment, fearing that she will have a detrimental impact on students across the country.
“By selecting Linda McMahon, Donald Trump is showing that he could not care less about our students’ futures. Rather than working to strengthen public schools, expand learning opportunities for students, and support educators, McMahon's only mission is to eliminate the Department of Education and take away taxpayer dollars from public schools, where 90% of students — and 95% of students with disabilities — learn, and give them to unaccountable and discriminatory private schools,” the National Education Association said in a statement.
Before she entered politics, McMahon was the leading lady of the WWE, which she founded with her husband, Vince McMahon, in 1980. Though McMahon usually sat in the crowd overseeing the pre-orchestrated spectacles that define pro-wrestling, she did occasionally hop in the ring to play out a scripted family drama — including, notably, a skit where she pretended to be drugged while her husband had an affair, before coming to and sending him off with a kick in the balls.
Though McMahon resigned from WWE 15 years ago, her past as wrestling mogul still follows both her and her husband. In October, a lawsuit was filed against the McMahons and WWE for allowing the abuse of “ring boys,” as young as 12 who assisted WWE announcer Melvin Phillips Jr., CNN reported. The lawsuit accused the couple of fostering "the WWE’s rampant culture of sexual abuse.” The McMahons have denied wrongdoing.
“Linda is this well-spoken, congenial, bright, well-dressed woman executive, but she helped run a testosterone-fueled business that was seen as very sleazy for a long time,” pro-wrestling expert Dave Letzer told The Washington Post. “That could be an issue for her, but Trump has so much baggage himself, and it seems that in politics these days, everything goes."
McMahon is just the latest Trump Cabinet appointee with a history of misconduct: Matt Gaetz, the president-elect's pick for attorney general, is being investigated for sex trafficking and having sex with a minor; Elon Musk, who was named to co-head the new Department of Government Efficiency, is facing a lawsuit filed by eight former Space X employees alleging sexual harassment; and Pete Hegseth, Trump’s pick to lead the Department of Defense, was accused of sexual assault in 2017.
