The Department of Education (DOE) has directed its workers to end all transgender-inclusive programs and policies in accordance with President Donald Trump’s anti-transgender executive orders. Trump has pledged to eliminate the DOE, Elon Musk, a Trump campaign donor who has been acting as if he were co-president, has given his underlings access to the DOE and its data, and LGBTQ+ congresspeople were denied entry into the DOE last Friday.

In an unsigned email sent last Friday from “ED Internal Communications,” DOE employees were told to end all programs, contracts, policies, outward-facing media, regulations, and internal practices that “fail to affirm the reality of biological sex,” ProPublica reported.

The email also said that DOE employees cannot use government property or work time to coordinate “employee resource groups that promote gender ideology and do not affirm the reality of biological sex,” though it’s unclear if any such groups currently operate within the DOE.

The email follows Trump’s executive orders, including one ending all federal-funded “gender ideology” and another banning all trans-inclusive school policies.

Another order seeking to ban trans athletes from all school sports has resulted in the DOE investigating two schools that allegedly allowed trans female athletes to compete on female sports teams. The DOE’s Office of Civil Rights (OCR) is also investigating a high school for creating a trans-inclusive restroom.

Last week, members of Musk’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) — which isn’t a real executive department — gained administrative access over DOE email accounts, allowing them to potentially access sensitive information, NBC News reported. The watchdog group Public Citizen sued to stop DOGE’s access to DOE data, including that of Americans who have applied for federal student aid.

“The scale of the intrusion into individuals’ privacy is enormous and unprecedented,” the suit states. “The personal data of over 42 million people lives in these systems.”

Last Wednesday, 95 Democratic Congress members signed an open letter to acting DOE Secretary Denise Carter asking to discuss Trump’s plans to eliminate the DOE. Trump has said he wants to dismantle the DOE in order to leave school oversight up to individual states, part of his larger plan to direct funds from public education to private, for-profit schools.

Last Friday morning, out Reps. Becca Balint (D-VT) and Mark Takano (D-CA) joined a group of Congress members who were denied entry into the department.

A man who identified himself as a federal employee refused to let them enter, stating that the congress members had no scheduled appointment with any DOE officials.

“Did Elon Musk hire you?” Balint asked the man.

“This is an outrage,” Takano shouted, adding, “We have oversight responsibilities.”

It’s unclear whether Congress members are allowed free access to federal departments as congressional oversight usually occurs through hearings or policy channels.

Trump is reportedly drafting an executive order to eliminate the DOE, even though it can only be eliminated by an act of Congress, the federal lawmaking body that created it in 1979. Though the department doesn’t dictate what schools can teach, it oversees educational loans and grants, enforcement of federal anti-discrimination policies (including for disabled and non-white students), and assists schools in rural and low-income areas. Many of its functions have wide bipartisan support.

In January, anti-LGBTQ+ Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY)  re-introduced a bill to eliminate the DOE. It has 30 Republican co-sponsors.