CA AG sues US Dept of Education over FERPA claim and funding

(The Center Square) – California Attorney General Rob Bonta filed a lawsuit this week against the U.S. Department of Education, disputing its claim that the California Department of Education violated the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act and challenging its threat to withhold $4.9 billion in federal education funding. Bonta’s lawsuit, filed against the Trump administration, seeks to block what he described as an unlawful interpretation of FERPA. At a virtual press conference on Thursday, Bonta said the California Department of Education is fully compliant with the law as written and argued that the federal agency does not have the authority to expand statutory requirements. “The Trump administration has been fond of looking at a law that is clear on what it requires and then twisting it and changing it. Rewriting it in their own minds into something that it is not that is consistent with their own political agenda,” Bonta told The Center Square. FERPA gives parents or guardian