BOSTON, June 4 (Reuters) - A federal appeals court has declined to lift a judge's order blocking President Donald Trump's administration from carrying out his executive order to dismantle the U.S. Department of Education and requiring it to reinstate employees who were terminated in a mass layoff.
The Boston-based 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on June 4 rejected the Trump administration's request to put on hold an injunction issued by a lower-court judge last week at the urging of several Democratic-led states, school districts and teachers' unions.
The U.S. Department of Justice had asked for a swift ruling from the 1st Circuit so that it could promptly take the case up to the 6-3 conservative majority U.S. Supreme Court if the appeals court did not rule in its favor.
The lawsuits were filed after Secretary of Education Linda McMahon in March announced plans to carry out a mass termination of over 1,300 employees, which would cut the department's staff by half as part of what it said was its "final mission."
Those job cuts were announced a week before Trump signed an executive order calling for the department's closure, following a campaign promise to conservatives aimed at leaving school policy almost entirely in the hands of states and local school boards.
