President-elect Donald Trump’s education secretary nominee Linda McMahon previously resigned from a high-ranking education post after her qualifications began to publicly unravel.
In 2009, the former WWE CEO was confirmed to Connecticut’s state board of education following a contentious hearing, in which critics questioned her fitness for the role if she remained involved in professional wrestling’s often controversial TV content.
McMahon’s answers to a questionnaire about her background, reportedly reviewed by then-Gov. Jodi Rell, were touted in a bid to buttress her credentials. However, several of McMahon’s answers were later revealed to be lies.
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Among her answers was a claim that she received a bachelor’s degree in education from East Carolina University in 1969, which turned out to be untrue. Her degree was in French.
After the Hartford Courant contacted her about the claim in 2010, she resigned, the newspaper reported.
McMahon previously tried to write off the discrepancy as a mistake, claiming that she conflated her student-teaching experience with a degree in education.
In a quote to the Boston Globe, Trump transition spokesperson Brian Hughes said the mix-up was addressed “many, many years ago.”
“These types of politically motivated attacks are the new normal for nominees ready to enact President Trump’s mandate for common sense that an overwhelming majority of Americans supported two weeks ago,” said Hughes.
McMahon on Wednesday did not immediately respond to request for comment.
Yet the degree revelation has hardly been the only controversy surrounding McMahon. Sex scandals have followed her husband Vince throughout his tenure over WWE, and recently a group of five former “ring boys” named the McMahons in a sex abuse lawsuit along with World Wrestling Entertainment and its parent company, TKO Group.
Both McMahon and her husband, Vince, have denied the allegations against them.
In response to the sex abuse lawsuit, McMahon’s lawyer, Laura A. Brevetti, called the claims “baseless.”
“This civil lawsuit based upon thirty-plus year-old allegations is filled with scurrilous lies, exaggerations, and misrepresentations regarding Linda McMahon,” Brevetti told the Daily Beast. “The matter at the time was investigated by company attorneys and the FBI, which found no grounds to continue the investigation.”
