1.7 million students in Texas and Illinois could lose support if federal English-learner programme is scrapped

• The House Appropriations Committee voted 34–28 to advance a bill that would eliminate Title III entirely, introduced as H.R. 9260.
• Texas has more than 1.18 million Title III-eligible students, according to House Democratic staff, while the state's broader emergent bilingual population has risen above 1.4 million — roughly one in four public-school students.
• Illinois has about 333,000 English learners. Its Title III allocation is approximately $30 million — far below the frequently cited $240 million, which actually represents five federal grant programmes combined.
• A stopgap funding bill passed the House on September 1 and was signed into law on September 2, giving Congress until December 11 to resolve the dispute.
• UnidosUS and 123 partner organisations are calling on Congress to fund Title III at $1 billion rather than eliminate it.

A House committee has voted to eliminate the only pool of federal money specifically designed to teach English to schoolchildren, with Texas and Illinois the two states whose students stand to lose the most.

The House Appropriations Committee cleared a fiscal 2027 spending bill in a 34–28 party-line vote that would abolish Title III of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act. The move would wipe out the programme's entire $890 million annual allocation for English-learner tutoring, teacher training and outreach to immigrant families. No other federal funding stream is written specifically for these students, most of whom are Hispanic and many of whom were born in the United States.

Washington has fought this battle before

This is not the first attempt by lawmakers to eliminate the programme. The administration's fiscal 2026 budget also proposed scrapping Title III, but Senate negotiators resisted and the final bill signed in February maintained the allocation at $890 million. Whether the same outcome is repeated will depend on a Senate that, at the time of writing, has not released its own fiscal 2027 education spending bill.

Inside the committee room

During the markup, Texas Representative Veronica Escobar offered an amendment to restore all Title III funding. She argued that the administration could not promote English as the country's official language while defunding programmes that teach it. "We can't have it both ways," she told fellow lawmakers. Subcommittee Chairman Robert Aderholt countered that state and local authorities were better placed than Washington to run the programmes. The amendment failed in a voice vote, meaning there is no official tally showing which lawmakers supported it.

The bill's total cost depends on which stage of the process is being considered. The version released by the committee before the markup allocated $189.3 billion to the three departments it covers, a 3% cut from current levels. After amendments were adopted, an outside tracker put the approved total at $201.8 billion — a 9% reduction — with the Education Department's share cut by 10% to $70.7 billion. Title III is not the only programme targeted: the bill would also eliminate the $2.2 billion Title II-A teacher-training programme and reduce Title I grants for low-income schools by about $1.9 billion.

What is at stake for Texas

Texas has more than 1.4 million emergent bilingual students, representing about one in four pupils in the state's public and charter schools, according to a 2026 analysis by the nonprofit Every Texan. A narrower estimate in a House Democratic staff analysis, focusing specifically on students served by Title III funding, put the number above 1.18 million.

The state has already experienced what the loss of federal funding can mean. Last summer, a separate nationwide funding freeze — unrelated to the current bill — left Austin Independent School District short of $9.6 million intended for English learners, migrant students and after-school programmes. The superintendent said the funding covered more than 100 positions before Washington eventually released it.

Why Illinois' figures are being confused

State education officials recorded 332,936 English learners across Illinois during the 2023–24 school year. The number has steadily increased and includes both newly arrived immigrants and US-born children of immigrant families. That is the context for untangling a widely cited funding figure.

Reports on a 2025 funding freeze put Illinois' exposure at approximately $240 million. The figure has since been repeated as though it referred solely to Title III. It does not. State officials who calculated the withheld funds said the total covered five separate programmes. Title III accounted for about $30.4 million, supporting nearly 293,000 English learners in 274 districts. The remaining amount covered teacher training, academic enrichment, after-school programmes and migrant education, all included in the same federal freeze. If the House bill's complete elimination of Title III becomes law, Illinois would lose that specific $30 million allocation — not the larger combined figure often associated with English-learner services.

The uncertainty has already created difficult decisions for schools. Monica Diaz, who oversees bilingual programmes in McHenry County's Harvard School District 50, described classrooms filled with children who arrive speaking no English and said delayed federal payments had made forward planning difficult. Administrators in nearby Mendota and Rochelle told local reporters they were postponing new curriculum purchases and tutoring contracts until they knew whether the funding would arrive.

Chicago enrolment continues to rise

Chicago Public Schools provides an indication of what could happen if support continues to shrink while the number of students grows. A Chalkbeat analysis of preliminary district data found that the number of English learners rose by more than 7,500 in a single school year, taking the total above 85,000 — nearly a quarter of all students enrolled in the district.

Hispanic Caucus and advocates push back

Congressional Hispanic Caucus Chair Adriano Espaillat has spent months joining other lawmakers in pressuring the administration on the issue, although he is not leading this particular effort. Florida Representative Frederica Wilson led a September 2025 letter co-signed by Espaillat, Illinois Representative Jesús "Chuy" García and dozens of other lawmakers. The letter called on the Education and Justice departments to restore civil-rights guidance for English learners after it was quietly withdrawn. "Every student in our nation deserves the opportunity to learn, grow and achieve," Espaillat said at the time.

Outside Congress, UnidosUS and 123 partner organisations are taking the opposite position to the House bill. They are asking appropriators to provide the full $1 billion for Title III in fiscal 2027 instead of eliminating the programme.

What happens between now and December

Congress bought itself more time on September 1, when the House passed a stopgap funding bill by 370–48. President Trump signed it into law the following day, keeping the government open through December 11. That schedule pushes the main fight over Title III into the lame-duck period after November's midterm elections. In the meantime, district administrators in Texas, Illinois and other states must plan staffing and curriculum purchases for the next school year without knowing whether the only federal programme specifically designed for English learners will still exist when students return to the classroom.

Originally published on Latin Times