California Attorney General Rob Bonta and attorneys general from seven other Democratic states are suing the Trump administration, claiming it illegally terminated federal grant funding for K-12 teacher preparation programs – a decision the attorneys general say will ultimately hurt students at a time when the nation is already facing teacher shortages.
The grants provide stipends or other supports for individuals training to become teachers, which help with efforts to recruit and retain educators and increases the number of qualified teachers – especially for hard-to-fill positions, Bonta said during a press conference at the state Department of Justice building in downtown Los Angeles on Thursday, March 6.
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Nationwide, about one in eight teaching positions was vacant or filled by uncertified teachers in 2024, Bonta said. Due to teacher shortages, schools end up with larger class sizes, canceled courses or teachers without the proper credentialing, he said, adding that President Donald Trump will “only make these problems worse” by ending the grant funding.
“Sadly, the people Trump’s hurting most of all are our kids – kids in rural areas, kids in urban areas, kids in high-poverty communities, in high-needs schools, kids who need and deserve extra support and additional resources, kids just trying to learn,” Bonta said.
According to the lawsuit – filed Thursday in U.S. District Court in Boston – the U.S. Department of Education in February notified grant recipients that it was terminating approximately $600 million in grants, effectively ending the Teacher Quality Partnership and the Supporting Effective Educator Development federal grant programs.
These programs educate, place and provide supports to aspiring or new teachers in hard-to-staff schools, particularly in rural and underserved communities, and in hard-to-fill courses like math and special education.
The Trump administration did not respond to a message seeking comment about Thursday’s lawsuit. But in February, the U.S. Department of Education announced it had cut $600 million in grants related to teacher training. The programs, the department said at the time, promoted “divisive” concepts like diversity, equity and inclusion; critical race theory and social justice activism.
In California, institutions and organizations that provide teacher preparatory programs were informed that they would lose a total of $148 million, according to Bonta, who is co-leading the multi-state lawsuit.
According to Bonta’s office, the U.S. Department of Education terminated an ongoing $8 million grant to UCLA to educate middle school principals and recruit individuals to teach middle school math, science, English and social studies.
The loss of this program would impact schools in the Los Angeles, Norwalk La Mirada, Glendale and Lancaster school districts and impact over 15,000 students, Bonta’s office said.
In addition, Cal State L.A. had previously been awarded $7.5 million for a teacher residency program focusing on special education, secondary STEM education and bilingual education but was informed it would lose funding, according to Bonta’s office. The ending of this program would impact classrooms in the Los Angeles and Pasadena Unified school districts.
A. Dee Williams, an administrator at Cal State L.A., said during the press conference that making sure students have qualified teachers “isn’t about politics.”
“This is about your kids having access to the best, most well-prepared teacher in their classroom. Your kids deserve better, and this is why we’re fighting – to make sure that they do,” he said.
Because such funding had previously been approved by Congress, Thursday’s lawsuit alleges that the Trump administration’s decision to terminate funding violated the Administrative Procedure Act.
Attorneys general for Massachusetts, New Jersey, Colorado, Illinois, Maryland, New York and Wisconsin are also involved in this suit.
During Thursday’s press conference, Jonathan Sze, a teacher-in-training through a Cal State L.A. program, said that without grant funding, he would not have been able to change careers.
The 27-year-old has a bachelor’s degree in pharmaceutical chemistry and was on his way to becoming a pharmacist before deciding to switch career paths. He’s currently paired with a master teacher to teach chemistry at Wilson High School in El Sereno, a neighborhood in L.A.’s Eastside, and expects to complete his training this spring.
Because he received his funding before the Trump administration announced the termination of the grants, Sze is not affected by the cuts. But he said after the press conference that he wanted to advocate for aspiring teachers who will come after him.
Sze said the curriculum he uses to teach his students is based on science when asked if he felt there was any “wokeness” to it – a term that Trump and other Republicans have used to describe what they consider ultra-liberal, progressive views.
“I teach chemistry, so it is very empirical,” Sze said. “It’s kind of hard to make it political, you know. Is an atom ‘Republican’ or ‘Democratic’? No, it’s an atom.”
Thursday’s lawsuit by the eight state attorneys general is the second such lawsuit against the Trump administration. On Monday, a similar lawsuit was filed by the American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education, the National Center for Teacher Residencies and others.
