Education Department Sued Over Cuts to Civil Rights Office

New York Times

14-03-2025

The Education Department on Friday was sued over deep cuts to its office assigned to enforce civil rights in schools, with two parents of disabled students and a disability rights group arguing that it had become an instrument of discrimination under the Trump administration.
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The lawsuit asserts the layoffs at the Education Department prevent its Office for Civil Rights from fulfilling its legal duties to promptly review and investigate complaints — not just pursue cases aligned with President Trump's agenda. It accuses the administration of sabotaging the office's work, making it harder for women and girls, L.G.B.T.Q. students and students of color to seek protections under civil rights laws. At the same time, the suit said, the administration prioritizes claims from people who are white, male or otherwise conform to the government's strict views of gender.
The suit also aims to force the government to rehire investigators in the civil rights office who lost their jobs this week. Over the past two months, the administration has cut the department's staff of 4,133 workers in half and closed seven of the 12 regional branches of the civil rights office.
Those firings and office closures have caused cases to abruptly be put on hold, fired employees and representatives of disability rights groups said in interviews.
The case was filed in the U.S. District Court in Washington by the Maryland-based Council of Parent Attorneys and Advocates on behalf of parents who said their civil rights complaints were left in limbo as a result of the layoffs in the civil rights office.
'In pausing thousands of complaints filed by the public while initiating and advancing selected investigations based on the administration's political priorities,' the lawsuit said, the Office for Civil Rights 'abdicated its responsibility to equitably consider complaints filed by students and their families, politicized its work and undermined its credibility as a neutral fact finder.'
The Education Department did not respond to a request for comment. Madi Biedermann, a department spokeswoman, said earlier this week that the agency was 'confident that the dedicated staff of O.C.R. will deliver on its statutory responsibilities.'
Mr. Trump's aggressive effort to overhaul the federal government by rapidly downsizing its work force has prompted a flurry of lawsuits from labor unions, state attorneys general and advocacy groups. Several of the suits make claims of discrimination and civil rights violations. But the one filed on Friday may be the first to accuse the Trump administration of targeting minority legal rights to advance its agenda. Mr. Trump has issued orders taking aim at diversity, equity and inclusion programs and rolling back transgender rights.
In 2024, the Office for Civil Rights fielded 22,687 complaints of discrimination in schools based on race, gender, disability and sexual orientation, an 18 percent increase from the previous year, according to an annual report.
Congress approved a $140 million budget for the office, for the salaries of 643 workers and other necessary resources, and the administration is obligated to spend those funds, according to the lawsuit. At the start of the year, investigators carried an average of roughly 50 cases, the lawsuit added.
Instead of following the law, the Trump administration barred the civil rights office from advancing pending cases and instead opened new investigations into programs for students of color and L.G.B.T.Q. students, according to the lawsuit.
On Friday, the Office for Civil Rights announced a new round of investigations into universities for 'awarding impermissible race-based scholarships' or other programs and activities based on 'racial preferences and stereotypes.'
Any previously opened cases face considerable hurdles after the layoffs, which diminished the chances for parents and students to have their complaints investigated in a 'prompt, fair, consistent and impartial manner,' the lawsuit said.
At the start of the new administration, civil rights investigators were barred from advancing pending cases even as new inquiries were opened that targeted programs for students of color and L.G.B.T.Q. students, according to the lawsuit.
One new investigation focused on an annual 'Students of Color United Summit' held by the school district in Ithaca, N.Y., which a conservative group known as the Equal Protection Project complained had discriminated against white students. Another new investigation took aim at Denver's public school system for creating a gender-neutral bathroom.
At a demonstration in Washington on Friday morning, dozens of people gathered below the vacant-looking windows of the Education Department headquarters to rally against what they called an agenda to undermine civil rights and public education.
Brittany Myatt, who was recently laid off as a lawyer for the Philadelphia branch of the department's civil rights office, told the crowd that 'civil rights should not be a 21st-century debate.' She said that she had been 'silenced' in her work as a voice for vulnerable children and communities.
Choking back tears, she recited a poem.
'Schools have lost a valuable asset, as O.C.R. had become a familiar facet to the important work that's done day in and day out at schools across the nation, serving diverse students throughout,' she said. 'To the students learning and growing up now, I wish I could take away your heartache somehow.'
Maria Town, the chief executive of the American Association of People With Disabilities and a White House official in the Obama administration, told the crowd about growing up as a disabled child in public schools, an experience she described as critical to her development.
'I was a student getting adaptive physical therapy at school, I was a student getting mental health counseling at school, I was getting developmental assessments at school,' Ms. Town said. 'My whole idea of what was possible for myself as a disabled kid who saw no one else like me in my community happened because I was included at school.'