Education Secretary Linda McMahon's proposed budget does include significant cuts to civil rights enforcement at the Education Department, which multiple outlets including the Times and NPR have confirmed. McMahon testified before the Senate this year and faced direct questioning about these cuts. The post frames her testimony as outright denial of cuts that are documented in her own budget proposal, which is an interpretive judgment about her honesty rather than a factual dispute — the cuts are real, but whether her testimony constitutes 'gaslighting' or a different framing of the same policies is subjective. What the post doesn't explain: the specific percentages vary depending on how you calculate baseline spending, and McMahon's defense appears to center on arguing the cuts are justified by her policy goals rather than denying they exist.