The Michigan State Board of Education believes President Donald Trump wants to “dismantle public education, weaken civil rights protections, and destabilize the economic security of hardworking families.”

The board on Tuesday declared its disdain for the 47^th POTUS with a resolution approved along party lines with only Democratic board members in favor. Republican board member Tom McMillin voted against the move, while Republican Nikki Snyder didn’t vote at all, Michigan Advance reports.

The Michigan State Board of Education passed a resolution opposing President Trump’s executive orders and changes to Title IX, stating that they are harmful and pose significant risks. Follow me at – @DaveBondyTV for more coverage. pic.twitter.com/mXXmv7kpSU

— Dave Bondy (@DaveBondyTV) March 12, 2025

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According to the board, Trump’s executive orders “pose direct threats to children, public education, and fundamental civil rights.”

The resolution “Defending Public Education, Civil Rights, and Democracy Against Executive Orders and Directives that Threaten our Children and Communities” points to the president’s plans to shut down the U.S. Department of Education, end birthright citizenship, eliminate diversity, equity, and inclusion programs, support school choice, and policies it describes as “federal overreach into curriculum and school policies.”

Board members lamented the potential loss of federal funds for not complying with the “direct assault disproportionately harming Black, Brown, Indigenous, LGBTQ+, immigrant, special education, and other historically marginalized communities.”

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The board is also partnering with the Michigan Department of Education and Attorney General Dana Nessel to defend “the constitutional and civil rights of all students, families, and educators in Michigan,” the resolution alleges.

The document goes on to affirm an “unwavering commitment” to DEI, “rejecting any federal efforts to undermine these principles,” and professes support for Nessel’s numerous legal challenges to Trump’s EOs.

The board also urged Michigan lawmakers to enact protections for state DEI and other education programs, and “calls on Congress and the U.S. Department of Education to reverse these harmful policies and uphold federal laws that safeguard equitable access to education for all students.”

The Democratic board members are encouraging Michigan schools to follow guidance from the Department of Education to defy Trump’s EOs, consult with legal counsel before any policy changes, and maintain DEI programs in schools.

“Some would suggest that we accept these changes without question, but let’s be clear—this type of change is not an evolution of policy, it is a dismantling of opportunity,” Michigan Board of Education President Pamela Pugh said. “More disheartening is that what some call ‘change’ will be detrimental for our schools and most vulnerable children, our economy, and our communities. Our children are already suffering under years of harmful policies, and this will only push them further behind.”

Tuesday’s resolution was followed by an announcement from the U.S. Department of Education the same day detailing plans to cut its workforce roughly in half, from 4,133 to 2,183, through nearly 1,400 layoffs and about 600 buyouts, WILX reports.

“That was the president’s mandate,” recently confirmed Education Secretary Linda McMahon told Fox News on Wednesday. “His directive to me, clearly, is to shut down the Department of Education, which we know we’ll have to work with Congress, you know, to get that accomplished.”

On Thursday, Pugh and Michigan Superintendent Michael Rice heaped praise on Nessel for joining a federal lawsuit to challenge that decision, which Rice claimed would “have a profound adverse impact on children’s education and supports across the country …”

“I applaud Attorney General Nessel and her attorney general counterparts for challenging actions that will harm children in Michigan and nationwide—in particular students with disabilities, poor children, children experiencing homelessness, and English learners, among others, who attend our schools in every corner of our great state and who depend on funding and support from the U.S. Department of Education to a far greater extent than other children,” Rice said.

Michigan House Republicans and eight Democrats on Wednesday passed a resolution calling on the Michigan High School Athletics Association to comply with Trump’s Feb. 5 executive order Keeping Men Out of Women’s Sports.

The private nonprofit that oversees Michigan’s interscholastic athletics told Bridge Michigan the MHSAA doesn’t plan to change its policy allowing boys in girls’ sports, effectively defying the 47^th POTUS.

The House resolution sparked outrage from transgender activists who are now targeting Democrats who supported it: Reps. Tullio Liberati, Alabas Farhat, Mai Xiong, Peter Herzberg, Reggie Miller, Denise Mentzer, Angela Witwer, and Will Snyder.

Schools across Michigan, meanwhile, are reconsidering transgender policies and others impacted by the president’s immigration enforcement efforts.