Mass firings, buyouts and heightened uncertainty led to an exodus of federal workers in 2025. More than 300,000 employees will be out of the government by the end of December.

On November 29, 1975, Republican President Gerald Ford signed the Education for All Handicapped Children Act into law, which later became the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). IDEA requires that disabled students have access to public education, discourages segregating disabled kids from their peers, and that qualifying students have access to individualized education plans , more commonly known as IEPs. IDEA does not apply to education in private schools. “Before our disabled elders secured our rights under the law, disabled kids were locked out of systems and out of their potential,” Rep. Lateefah Simon (D-Ca.), who is blind, told me in a statement. Many disability advocates are concerned about the state of education for disabled kids. Continued attempts to dismantle the Department of Education by President Donald Trump and Education Secretary Linda McMahon, as well as attempts to  fire their staff , put the oversight that disabled kids’ needs are met at risk. Such oversight includes putting districts on notice for funding if they overpenalize Black disabled students , for instance. Then, there is the longstanding issue that IDEA has never been fully funded, meaning that the federal government is not funding IEPs to 40 percent. “Congress must protect and fully fund the IDEA to ensure future generations of disabled children have the supports and services they need to thrive in school,” Simon continued. “Our civil rights are not up for negotiations.” This is not to say that all students’ needs are adequately met under the IDEA. Jordyn Zimmerman, a nonspeaking autistic person, told me that she did not have access to effective communication via iPad until she was 18. “When I finally gained access to effective communication,  required under IDEA  and also the ADA,  there was a realization that I could learn, and I was slowly included in the school community, until I graduated at the age of 21,” Zimmerman said, who is the board chair of CommunicationFIRST . “So that really highlights,  both the flaws, but also the power in when the spirit is fulfilled with intentionality.” Zimmerman is also very concerned about attacks on the Department of Education. “Without a strong Department of Education, states can redirect money away from students with disabilities, so that high-quality education will only exist for some,” Zimmerman said. “Students also won’t get the funding for the therapies, assistive technology, and specially-designed instruction that students need, and families depend on.” “I will fight that with everything that I have, because IEPs are protection for these kids.” Samantha Phillis, an advocate with Little Lobbyists , told me that her two daughters, who are in public school, are on IEPs, one of whom is autistic and one has spinal muscular atrophy. Phillis is currently experiencing her school trying to walk back her IEP, which she suspects is common for kids with disabilities who appear to have lower support needs. “I will fight that with everything that I have, because IEPs are protection for these kids,” Phillis said. Phillis’ daughter with spinal muscular atrophy also has a nurse with her at all times in school due to her complex health needs. The nurse receives some funding through Medicaid, so Phillis is also terrified about how Medicaid cuts will impact her daughter’s ability to attend school. “It’s one of the biggest heartbreaks I think I’ve ever experienced in my entire life is seeing how people like my daughters are affected by this administration,” Phillis told me. There have not been recent attempts to repeal IDEA yet, though Project 2025 encourages funding to be given directly to states, but this is a concern for Nadia Hasan, a woman with cerebral palsy who credits IDEA with helping her succeed in school. “There’s just a lot more like isolation and lack of opportunity,” Hasan told me. Marleen Salazar, a Texan with learning disabilities who is now an undergraduate student at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley, credits her special education teachers for helping her learn to advocate for herself. “They were very much a very key part of building me that confidence and advocacy to make sure that I expressed what I needed and what I didn’t need,” Salazar told me. This advocacy included being able to take standardized tests in a room by herself, as well as getting extended time. Salazar’s younger sister, who is dyslexic, now has accommodations as well. Salazar has concerns about what will happen if funding is rolled back. “The fear is if funding is cut, or the state doesn’t want to provide these resources anymore, what does that mean for her in the future?”

Indigenous actor Elaine Miles of "Northern Exposure" was detained by ICE at a Redmond bus stop. When she showed them her Tribal ID, they told her it was fake.

YouTube video by TheSunAnge

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A federal judge on Friday ruled President Trump unlawfully called up and planned to deploy Oregon’s National Guard to Portland, the most decisive blow yet to his bid to send troops into Democratic-led cities where protests have centered on federal immigration facilities.  U.S. District Judge Karin Immergut, a Trump appointee, permanently blocked the president from sending Oregon’s soldiers into the city after determining that the president ran afoul of federal law and stepped on the state's sovereignty in his bid to send the troops into Portland streets. It marks the first time a judge has ruled on the underlying legal merits of Trump’s aggressive use of the National Guard, as challenges to his efforts in Los Angeles, Chicago and Washington, D.C., continue to move through the courts.   “To be clear, today this Court does not rule that the President can never deploy the National Guard to Oregon, or to any other location, if conditions on the ground justify the Guard’s intervention,” Immergut wrote. “But under the U.S. Constitution, Congress possesses the power to call up the National Guard ‘to execute the Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrections, and repel Invasions,’ and Congress’s delegation of its power to the President is by statute.   “Unless and until the President lawfully federalizes National Guardsmen...‘National Guard members serve solely as members of the State militia under the command of a state governor,'" she said.  The decision comes on the heels of a three-day trial , which featured testimony from local and federal law enforcement — often in tension — about the nature of the protests at the heart of the case.    Trump called up Oregon’s National Guard in September, promising to protect “war-ravaged” Portland and its U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facility. State and city officials quickly sued to block his efforts.    The president initially federalized and moved to deploy 200 Oregon troops, but after Immergut temporarily blocked the effort, he sought to send troops from California and Texas into the city, prompting the judge to bar any troops from being deployed. The administration has appealed.   At trial, Justice Department (DOJ) lawyers argued that Trump lawfully federalized the National Guard under a provision of Title 10 that lists three circumstances where the president may do so: an invasion, a rebellion or an inability to execute the law with regular forces.  They claimed that the protests outside Portland’s ICE facility have thwarted federal officers’ ability to do their jobs without help and amounted to rebellion against the government, while maintaining that courts should not review Trump’s determination.  “Congress, in Section 12406, made those decisions for the president to make,” said DOJ lawyer Eric Hamilton, referencing the provision.  Two Federal Protective Service supervisors testified anonymously that the National Guard would alleviate strains, though they conceded that neither requested military assistance.   Immergut noted their testimony in her ruling, in addition to the testimony of Maj. Gen. Timothy Rieger, acting vice chief of the National Guard Bureau, who said he had no personal knowledge of the situation on the ground in Portland when issuing the memo proposing the troops’ assistance.   Portland police provided a different picture of the scene on the ground in testimony.  They said that largely peaceful protests have already been inflamed by the few federal officers on site and pointed to the  riots that consumed the city in 2020  to exemplify how tactless policing can rile up crowds.   The officers also used the 2020 demonstrations — which began as peaceful demonstrations after George Floyd’s police killing in Minneapolis but devolved into 200 days of sustained protest and sometimes violent clashes — to undermine the administration’s contention that the city is now under siege.   “It was just an entirely different type of disorder,” Portland Police Bureau Cmdr. Franz Schoening  said of the protests  five years ago.   A three-judge panel on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit  paused one  of Immergut’s orders last month, but the appeals court vacated that decision and said the full court would rehear the case.   Trump’s efforts to deploy the National Guard to major cities have seen varying success.   Troops are on the ground in California and D.C., but courts have so far blocked deployment in Illinois — though the situation could rapidly change.   The Supreme Court is  weighing an emergency application  from the administration to let it deploy the National Guard to the Chicago area but has not yet ruled.   The judge temporarily paused a portion of her final judgment for 14 days, so Trump may maintain control of Oregon’s National Guard but not deploy any troops as the administration appeals.

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