The federal government has no jurisdiction over education. The only exception to that is the civil rights (Brown v. Board of Education) and it's quite limited in scope. COVID is certainly out of scope.
The presidential talk about it is just that - talk.
https://www.gse.harvard.edu/news/ed/17/08/when-it-comes-educ...
It's possible that GP was referring to the current federal government in general re: Covid-19, not specifically their jurisdiction over education. And in that sense they're correct: the current leadership in the US is a disaster and "worse than useless".
And even if Trump issued a "mask mandate" on the first day, for example, who is to enforce it? The FBI?
Do you think they have no levers to pull to affect policy from a federal level other than physically forcing people to do things? I'm not really sure what your point is.