Delivered via email: November 3, 2025
Federal employees continue to be furloughed or work without pay if they are deemed essential workers. However, a judge has issued a preliminary injunction to halt earlier efforts by the Administration to permanently lay off federal workers, including more than 460 Department of Education staff. These actions had particularly harmed the Office of Special Education Programs (OSEP) and the Office of Elementary and Secondary Education (OESE). The injunction will prevent additional layoffs during the government shutdown.
A bill to pay essential federal workers during the shutdown failed in the Senate; other measures to provide funds for particular programs such as SNAP have been blocked by Congressional leaders in the Senate. The House has not returned to Washington to conduct legislative business since their passage of a Continuing Resolution (CR) to temporarily fund the government in place of annual appropriations measures on September 19. Though efforts to pass a CR continue to fail, conversations are ongoing and include the potential passage of annual appropriations measures, including the Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education Appropriations bill in combination with other appropriations legislation.
COSSBA will host a webinar November 6 at 1 p.m. on the status of the federal budget and the impact to the U.S. Department of Education.
Chair of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee Bill Cassidy introduced a second bill related to AI, S. 3063, on October 28 to safeguard student data privacy, enhance transparency, and encourage the responsible use of AI in K-12 learning. The Learning Innovation and Family Empowerment (LIFE) with AI Act is intended to provide protections for student data, simplified opt-outs for parents, process reforms for school district contracts and vendors, teacher training resources, and a research agenda for federal research and development. This follows the introduction of the bipartisan Recommending Artificial Intelligence Standards in Education (RAISE) Act (S. 2740) by the Chair and Senators Jon Husted and Lisa Blunt Rochester in September, signifying a strong interest in AI-related legislation for the HELP Committee.
Government Shutdown
The federal government shutdown continues; on Tuesday night it will become the longest government shutdown in history. November 1 marked the first time that Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) funding was delayed for SNAP recipients. To assist the nearly two million Illinois SNAP recipients, Governor JB Pritzker signed an Executive Order to direct $20 million to Illinois food banks. On October 31, a federal judge ruled that the U.S. Department of Agriculture must use an emergency contingency fund to at least partially fund SNAP. The Department of Agriculture indicated on November 3 that it would utilize $4.65 billion in contingency funds to partially fund the program, providing a temporary reprieve while Congress works to pass a Continuing Resolution to fund the government in place of annual appropriations bills.Federal employees continue to be furloughed or work without pay if they are deemed essential workers. However, a judge has issued a preliminary injunction to halt earlier efforts by the Administration to permanently lay off federal workers, including more than 460 Department of Education staff. These actions had particularly harmed the Office of Special Education Programs (OSEP) and the Office of Elementary and Secondary Education (OESE). The injunction will prevent additional layoffs during the government shutdown.
A bill to pay essential federal workers during the shutdown failed in the Senate; other measures to provide funds for particular programs such as SNAP have been blocked by Congressional leaders in the Senate. The House has not returned to Washington to conduct legislative business since their passage of a Continuing Resolution (CR) to temporarily fund the government in place of annual appropriations measures on September 19. Though efforts to pass a CR continue to fail, conversations are ongoing and include the potential passage of annual appropriations measures, including the Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education Appropriations bill in combination with other appropriations legislation.
COSSBA will host a webinar November 6 at 1 p.m. on the status of the federal budget and the impact to the U.S. Department of Education.