The Democratic party seized control of the U.S. House of Representatives on Tuesday in a decisive rebuke of President Trump’s dishonesty, racism, misogyny, cruelty, and incompetence. But the blue wave crested short of some people’s outsize expectations, particularly in rural areas and the South. Even more than before the election, America is deeply divided — by ideology, by geography, and, increasingly, by higher education.
The Democratic majority in the House spells the end of current Republican plans to reauthorize the federal Higher Education Act. The Public Service Loan Forgiveness Program will not be repealed, and Congress will not outlaw the “gainful employment” rules created by the Obama administration to rein in fraudulent for-profit colleges. Pell Grant and student-loan programs should be safe and stable for the next two years.
The chance to renew the Higher Education Act creates an opportunity for Democrats vying for the 2020 presidential nomination. If Bernie Sanders’s insurgent 2016 campaign taught the party anything, it was, “Don’t let a socialist get to your left on the cost of college.” Expect a lot of debate over proposals for free college, debt-free college, free community college, and the like.
Managing those competing pressures will be a challenge for the House Committee on Education and the Workforce as its new chairman works to set the table for a major HEA overhaul in 2021. “Free college” really means free public college and will be opposed by the influential lobby representing private nonprofit colleges and universities. Rep. Bobby Scott, the ranking Democrat on the committee and most likely the new chairman, has already put his own free-college plan on the table.
We are likely to see an acceleration of fear-mongering and xenophobia flowing from the White House. That puts colleges and universities directly at risk.
Republican gains in the Senate will make it harder to impeach President Trump, which means the U.S. Department of Education will continue advancing its deregulatory agenda. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos has little understanding of or interest in higher education, and the Trump White House has simply failed to hire anyone to occupy several of the department’s high-ranking college-related jobs.
The resulting vacuum has been filled by a small group of former lobbyists and executives from the disgraced for-profit college industry who have been hard at work making federal rules more friendly to their former employers. That work will continue in January with a new set of regulations designed to make it easier for corporations to prey on unsuspecting students paying tuition with federal grants and loans. But the Democratically controlled House will no doubt be issuing subpoenas to investigate dealings between department staff and outside lobbyists.
State races were mixed but leaned left, especially in Wisconsin, where Gov. Scott Walker, breaker of unions and enemy of the “Wisconsin Idea,” will be replaced by the mild-mannered state school superintendent Tony Evers. Republican legislative losses in North Carolina may dampen the party’s increasingly bitter conflict with the state’s renowned public universities.
More broadly, the election accelerated the trend of political tribalism defined by college degrees. Historically, college-educated white women have been persuadable by both sides. This week, that demographic broke decisively against Republicans. But the flip side is continuing strength on the right in areas that are less populated, less developed, and have fewer residents with college experience.
Those places, and the Southern states as a whole, largely stayed in the Republican camp. This week’s losses were not severe enough to force a generational repudiation of far-right extremism. The Republicans who won are more conservative and Trump-aligned than those who lost, which means we are likely to see an acceleration of fear-mongering and naked xenophobia flowing from the White House. That puts colleges directly at risk.
Our mobile society gives well-educated people the ability to congregate in economically prosperous and socially progressive metropolitan areas, mostly on the coasts. But while college graduates can relocate, colleges can’t. Many of them are in places that increasingly reject core values of tolerance and equality, which makes public funding and political capital scarcer in a time when many less-elite institutions are struggling to survive. Colleges have historically enjoyed bipartisan support, but that could change if one party decides that its majority depends on a strong supply of voters without degrees.
Trumpism, meanwhile, requires a fresh diet of enemies. This week, the Others live in a small group of Central American refugees. Next week, they could be on campus among the so-called socialist professoriate and the dreaded politically correct.
And as we saw in Charlottesville last year, colleges are uniquely open institutions, accessible to anyone who arrives at their doorstep and deeply committed to accommodating diverse points of view. Those qualities are central to the academic mission and can’t be compromised — but they also make colleges especially vulnerable to violent, armed extremists who will take this election as a new reason to be angry and afraid.
That means that higher-education leaders have two main challenges before them. First, build momentum for state and federal policies that make higher learning more effective, affordable, and accessible, with an eye toward even greater political opportunities in the near future.
Second, do everything possible to protect and support one another in what could be a time of maximum danger.
This week’s election may be the beginning of the end of Trumpism, but there are many risks and battles ahead.
Kevin Carey directs the education-policy program at New America.
