On Nov. 19, 2024, in a statement posted on Truth Social, President-elect Donald Trump nominated Linda McMahon, 76, to serve as U.S. Secretary of Education in his administration.
His statement says she is a “fierce advocate for Parents” Rights.” It says she will “fight tirelessly” to expand school choice. It says her leadership will “empower the next Generation of American Students and Workers, and make America Number One in Education in the World.” It says McMahon will spearhead an effort to “send Education BACK TO THE STATES.”
“I am committed to working tirelessly to ensure every student has access to quality education,” McMahon responded in this post on LinkedIn. “I’ve witnessed the transformative power of education, both in the classroom and also in apprenticeship programs. All students should be equipped with the necessary skills to prepare them for a successful future.”
“I look forward to working collaboratively with students – educators – parents and communities to strengthen our educational system; ensuring every child regardless of their demographics is prepared for a bright future,” she said.
Margaret Spellings, former president of the UNC System, told Inside Higher Ed that McMahon’s business background will be an asset and that her nomination “makes a lot of sense.”
“When people say, ‘Well she’s not a teacher,’ I say, ‘The department is not a school,’” Spellings told the outlet. “The department is essentially a big bank. It’s a management job.”
Michael Petrilli, president of the Thomas B. Fordham Institute, told the New York Times that her business experience could be useful given the dollars the department oversees and the FAFSA debacle, but he said he did not think she would be a “thought leader.”
McMahon has roots in North Carolina
Linda Marie Edwards was born in New Bern in 1948. An only child, her parents were civil service employees at Cherry Point, a nearby Marine Corps Air Station, where her father was the foreman in a shop repairing aircraft and her mother was a budget analyst.
At 13, she met her future husband, then Vinnie Lupton (the last name of a step-father) who is now known as Vince McMahon. He was born in Pinehurst, but they met in Craven County, where Vince had relocated with his mom. The families became friends.
Linda attended Havelock High School, where she was a member of the National Honor Society, while Vince went to Fishburne Military School in Waynesboro, Virginia.
She was a Girl Scout, and she has written about what you can learn about business from selling cookies.
Team sports have also been important to Linda. She played basketball, becoming locally celebrated for her jump shot. She also played first base on a boys’ baseball team. Later in life, she played on a slow-pitch softball team.
After Linda graduated high school, she married Vince in 1966 — she was 17, and he was 21.
Both students went on to graduate from East Carolina University (ECU). Linda graduated with a degree in French, and she obtained a teaching certificate, according to ECU.
After graduation, the couple moved to Washington, DC, and then Massachusetts before settling in Connecticut. Early on the couple went bankrupt, losing their house and the car parked in their driveway. Linda was pregnant with their second child, and she has written that she wondered how they would recover and move forward.
Linda lives in Stamford, Connecticut, where she has significant ties to Sacred Heart University, including serving as treasurer on the board of trustees. In this interview at Sacred Heart, Linda interviews Campbell Brown, who co-founded The 74, about journalism, business, and women in leadership.
A Catholic, Linda is a mother to two and grandmother to six. Both of her children graduated from a public high school. This Wikipedia page about the family includes a family tree.
Vince’s real-time net worth, according to Forbes, is $2.5 billion, and their combined net worth may be as high as $3.2 billion. They have made significant contributions to Republican politics. Here is information about their family foundation and the philanthropic investments they have made over the years.
An attorney for Linda has said the couple is separated.
This interview on Coach Lou Holtz’s podcast is her longest, most recent interview.
Ongoing ties to ECU
In 2007, McMahon was recognized as one of ECU’s “100 Incredible Women.”
Both Linda and Vince McMahon have endowed professorships at the university. The Linda McMahon Distinguished Professorship in Foreign Languages in the Thomas Harriot College of Arts and Sciences was endowed in 2009 by the McMahon Family Foundation, and it was first awarded in 2012. Most recently, the professorship was held by Dr. Katherine Ford, with an appointment that ran from 2019 to 2023. The Vincent K. McMahon Distinguished Professorship in Business is currently held by Dr. John Kros, with a five-year appointment that runs until August 2025.
ECU hosts the Linda E. McMahon Lecture Series. The most recent lecture in August 2024 “emphasized the importance of building a diverse community of language speakers,” according to the university. In 2023, the lecture focused on the history of the DuPont Corporation, and in 2022, the lecture explored, “what would a feminist city be like?”
2018 commencement address and honorary degree
In 2018, McMahon was ECU’s commencement speaker.
“I look at your faces and see myself 49 years ago sitting as part of this sea of caps and gowns,” she said.
She said she’s taken a lot of risks and had some failures amid success. She said she always asks questions because she likes to learn how things work. ‘Challenge the status quo. At work, treat everyday as if it’s your first day on the job,’ McMahon said. ‘Your success will come from doing something better, smarter and more innovative than what’s been done before.’
She encouraged graduates to ‘find your passion, play to your strengths and never lose your curiosity. I think these apply to business or any path you take. While you can’t script your life, your values will drive your narrative.’
ECU press release about McMahon’s commencement address in 2018
In recognition of her leadership, accomplishments, and service, ECU awarded McMahon an honorary doctorate of humanities degree, approved by the ECU Board of Trustees.
McMahon’s career
McMahon is the co-founder and former CEO of World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE), a family business she helped grow from “a 13-person regional operation to a publicly traded global enterprise with more than 800 employees in offices worldwide.” Read this Q&A by TIME about how she built the WWE, and this profile by Bloomberg, “Blood, Sweat, and a Lady Named Linda.”
She also co-founded and served as the CEO of Women’s Leadership LIVE, which her LinkedIn profile says, “used live events and ongoing webinars to educate and inspire women to launch and expand their own businesses, advance their careers toward executive roles, and pursue opportunities for leadership in public service.”
She served on APCO Worldwide‘s international advisory council, which is made up of global leaders providing real-world knowledge and counsel to APCO clients. APCO has a presence in North Carolina.
McMahon served as the 25th Administrator of the U.S. Small Business Administration and as a member of Trump’s cabinet from February 2017 to April 2019. In that role, she directed a federal agency with 2,000 employees. In her testimony to the Senate on her nomination, she said that small businesses are the engine of our national economy.
“The bipartisan 81 to 19 confirmation vote was one of President Donald Trump’s least contentious nominations,” according to NBC News. As the administrator, she launched the SBA Ignite Tour, visiting cities across the country to fuel “small businesses with tools and resources to grow their companies and create more American jobs.”
She has experience assessing the impact of disasters and recovery. In October 2012, Hurricane Sandy hit the coast from the Caribbean to Canada. She wrote about her experience of the aftermath here. She and Trump visited North Carolina together after Hurricane Florence.
From 2019 to 2020, she chaired the America First Action Super PAC, which supported Trump.
Since 2021, she has served as chair of the board and chair of the Center for the American Worker for the America First Policy Institute.
According to its website, “The America First Policy Institute (AFPI) is a 501(c)(3) non-profit, non-partisan research institute. AFPI exists to advance policies that put the American people first. Our guiding principles are liberty, free enterprise, national greatness, American military superiority, foreign-policy engagement in the American interest, and the primacy of American workers, families, and communities in all we do.” You can find her op-eds and interviews in this role here.
Note that this institute is not associated with Project 2025 but has its own conservative agenda with 10 pillars. The chapters on education include:
Give parents control by allowing them to select the school their child attends,
Give every parent the right to see all curriculum materials in every class their child attends,
Encourage schools to teach basic skills that prepare students for life as an adult, and
Advocate for teaching the truth about America’s history.
America First Policy Institute website
Here you can see AFPI’s policy positions on higher education, K-12, and school boards.
In April 2024, AFPI released its health, opportunity, prosperity, and empowerment agenda, a 20-point policy framework for federal and state policymakers seeking to reduce the number of abortions in America.
AFPI urges states to adopt six policies to address what they call “radical gender theory,” including “protecting women’s sports, protecting children from sex reassignment surgeries and hormones, policy defining women based on biology, parental bill of rights, restricting obscene live performances (drag shows) for kids, [and] keeping radical gender ideology out of schools.”
Here is AFPI’s statement on critical race theory. Critical race theory is an academic framework that argues that racism is systemic and embedded within the country’s institutions. Kimberlé Crenshaw, a founding critical race theorist, described critical race theory this way: “Critical race theory is a practice. It’s an approach to grappling with a history of white supremacy that rejects the belief that what’s in the past is in the past, and that the laws and systems that grow from that past are detached from it.”
McMahon is serving as co-chair of the transition team for the Trump administration. She believes Trump is a “good man,” but she has also been willing to criticize him regarding his comments about women.
Foray into education and politics
In January 2009, Connecticut Gov. Jodi Rell nominated McMahon to the “11-member state Board of Education, which establishes academic standards and sets policy for Connecticut’s 149 local and 17 regional school districts,” according to a press release.
Rell said at the time, “Linda clearly understands the skills and education needed to succeed in business and the type of highly educated and skilled workforce that must be available to ensure that success.”
The New York Times has reported, “After a contentious floor debate, the House voted to approve Ms. McMahon by a vote of 96-45, an unusual split for a minor appointment in Connecticut.”
In a 2014 interview, she said that on the board she learned “it comes down to having good teachers in the classroom, good administration of the schools, and a dedication to educating the students.”
To run for U.S. Senate in 2009, she stepped down as CEO of WWE, and in 2010, she resigned from the board of education.
She was the Republican nominee in 2010 and 2012. Here is her 2012 campaign plan. It says, “There is no better way to create jobs than to educate our children and adult learners.” Note her strategy to empower a skilled workforce.
In 2010, she described herself in this interview on The View as socially moderate and pro-choice. She said the right to marry should be decided by the states.
McMahon lost the 2012 race to Democrat Christopher Murphy in what the New York Times called a “bitter race.”
When McMahon was up for the SBA job, Murphy told The Hill, “She is unquestionably qualified for this job.” He also noted that he thought she would bring “important moderate values to the administration.”
Education Week is reporting that the “Connecticut senators aren’t embracing McMahon’s nomination for education secretary.”
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Where does she stand on policy now?
In September 2024, McMahon wrote this op-ed for The Hill, where she advocates for extending Pell Grant eligibility to fund the skills training and technical education she says most workers rely on.
She believes, “The nation’s greatest asset is the American worker.”
She says, “America’s skilled workforce is unparalleled worldwide in technology, health care, trades and manufacturing.”
She says, “Our educational system must offer clear and viable pathways to the American Dream aside from four-year degrees.”
She supports apprenticeships.
Her advice to students? “Take some risk, don’t be afraid to fail, and just love life.”
Trump has said he intends to “close up” the U.S. Department of Education, and a bill has been filed to abolish the department. It is not clear where McMahon stands on that, but Congress would have to agree.
Ask & Answer | What’s the impact of federal funding on education in North Carolina?
What’s in the headlines?
Her husband is in the headlines. Netflix launched a six-episode docuseries — titled “Mr. McMahon” — in September 2024 to explore WWE’s “record-breaking highs and crushing lows under Vince McMahon’s leadership.” Here is more information about the series.
The interviews for the series were conducted in 2022 before The Washington Post broke this story about alleged misconduct. A lawsuit was filed against her husband in January 2024 by a former employee. He has denied wrongdoing, and the lawsuit is on hold pending a federal investigation.
According to CNN, Linda McMahon is a defendant in another recently filed lawsuit that alleges she knowingly allowed an employee to sexually exploit “ring boys.” Her attorney has denied the allegations. Education Week published an article about her role in this lawsuit today.
Given her nomination, there is renewed scrutiny of her own incorrect disclosure that she had a degree in education. This was first reported on 10 years ago and then recently surfaced by The Washington Post. “The clarification was addressed many, many years ago,” Brian Hughes, a spokesman for the Trump transition, told the Post.
WWE videos of McMahon are going viral since the announcement the she has been nominated to be the U.S. Secretary of Education.
What are education advocates saying?
The NEA released this statement regarding her nomination, which includes “Our students and our nation deserve so much better than Betsy DeVos 2.0.”
Teach for America issued this statement regarding her nomination, which includes that the nomination “presents an opportunity for the Secretary-designate and incoming administration to address the critical needs of our students, schools and communities, and to ensure that all students have the resources and support they deserve to learn and thrive.”
The former superintendent of the Stamford public schools in Connecticut wrote this op-ed in Education Week about McMahon, noting that while he has concerns about Trump’s education agenda, he found in his interactions with her that she was “thoughtful and inquisitive” and “focused on our shared interests in improving our community’s schools.”
McMahon will have to be confirmed by the U.S. Senate.
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