The White House is working on an executive order to shutter the Education Department, an attempt to fulfill President Trump's campaign promise and a decades-long GOP ambition. 

Sources have told national news outlets that the order is being worked on, but it is unclear when Trump will sign it.

During the campaign, Trump promised he would shut down the department and give education back to the states.

“One other thing I’ll be doing very early in the administration is closing up the Department of Education in Washington D.C., and sending all education and education work and needs back to the states," Trump said in a campaign video.

The department is relatively well known, having been established in 1979 by then-Democrat President Jimmy Carter. 

The next president, Republican, Ronald Reagan, three years later called for an end to the department. Since then, conservative-mined lawmakers have tried to at least weaken the department by cutting its funding. 

Trump appears to also need congressional approval to dismantle the department.