Every Senate Democrat voted against Linda McMahon’s nomination as Education Secretary, so Republicans own the incompetence she displays in her role. On Tuesday, McMahon testified before the Senate on TACO Trump’s 2026 budget and received a math lesson from Democratic Senator John Reed after she screwed up the numbers when MAGA GOP Senator John Kennedy questioned her.
Of course, the Louisiana Republican did not notice because his numbers were way off, too, so Reed jumped on it.
“I’m not a great mathematician, but I think you were talking about a trillion dollars?” Reed asked. “I believe $1.5 billion times 10 is $15 billion, and that’s a little bit off from a trillion dollars.”
“I think the budget cuts $1.2 billion,” McMahon replied.
“Well, that would be $12 billion, not a trillion dollars,” Reed calmly said.
“OK,” McMahon said.
McMahon was spanked by other Democrats as well. Washington State Sen. Patty Murray had to explain to her that “Those funds were appropriated by Congress, and your department was to allocate them, and it looks like the department is illegally impounding funding.” Jinkies, I’m seeing a pattern with Trump’s picks.
McMahon also claimed that math and reading education were “low on the totem pole” in 1979. She had to be corrected by GOP Oklahoma Sen. Markwayne Mullin, who said, “We were number one in 1979.”
Sen. Tammy Baldwin asked McMahon, Are you going to allocate all of the funding Congress appropriated for students in schools in Wisconsin and across the country this year?”
“What we have done in putting forward our operating plan, the first operating plan to show where we’re making allocations, and then followed up with the second operating plan…” McMahon said.
“This isn’t a nuanced question,” Baldwin interrupted. “Congress passed a law appropriating this funding. You said in your confirmation hearing that you would spend the funding Congress appropriated. If the answer isn’t simply ‘yes,’ based on all the evidence before us, that leads me to believe that you are planning to withhold funding and short-change schools, students, and families across America.”
The poor dear is having a bad day.
