Education Department abandons civil rights focus on Black students

The Department of Education under the Trump administration has largely abandoned generations of enforcing discrimination against Black students, casting those efforts as unfair to white students. 

Programs that aim to help Black students have now been deemed "illegal DEI " — diversity, equity and inclusion — by the White House. Schools have been investigated, and some have lost federal funding. 

What they’re saying: In a statement, the Education Department said programs receiving federal funding must follow the law, which prohibits discrimination based on race.

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"Serving student needs and following the law are not irreconcilable mandates. Advocates and educators have no reason to stress if they abide by the law," said Amelia Joy, a department spokesperson.

The other side:

Civil rights advocates, however, describe the actions as a complete inversion of legal history.

"It’s literally flipping the purpose of civil rights law on its head, not just harming Black students and students of color, but entire school communities," said Michael Pillera, director of educational equity issues at the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law. "It’s unmoored from the actual history of our country and untethered to the reality of life in this country."

Funds withheld after investigation

Local perspective:

The U.S. government has opened investigations or joined litigation over a wide range of efforts to address racial inequality. The Justice Department is investigating programs to increase the number of teachers of color in Rhode Island and Iowa. And grants to districts to train teachers or recruit school mental health workers have been discontinued for mentions of diversity in recruitment.

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The Trump administration investigated Chicago Public Schools and withheld more than $20 million when the district refused to end its Black Student Success Program, which aims to increase access to advanced coursework for Black students and reduce overly harsh discipline.

A similar effort to close racial achievement gaps in Los Angeles is under the same pressure.

Los Angeles Unified School District created the Black Student Achievement Plan after an outpouring of student activism following the 2020 murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis. It supports schools with extra teachers, counselors and curriculum in Black history.

LAUSD has seen signs of impact. In recent state testing, Black students in the district outperformed the average Black student in California.

"When you provide teachers and school personnel with knowledge and skills to help your lowest performing students, everyone wins," said Tyrone Howard, an education professor at UCLA who consulted on BSAP.

More districts released from desegregation orders

Dig deeper:

Under President Trump, the Justice Department has released more school districts from court-ordered desegregation plans dating back to the Civil Rights Movement, describing them as outdated and burdensome. And the Education Department has stripped funding from some districts that used it to create magnet schools intended to be more diverse.

The Trump administration has repeatedly pointed to a broad interpretation of the Supreme Court’s ruling on affirmative action, which prevented colleges and universities from directly considering race in admissions.

While that ruling pertained only to admissions, the administration last winter notified schools that any differential consideration based on race was unconstitutional. A federal court struck down that guidance last year, but advocates say schools may still preemptively end equity programs to avoid drawing federal scrutiny.

"LAUSD’s desegregation program has outlived its usefulness to the point of being unconstitutional," an assistant U.S. attorney said in a news release.

Other advocates say that’s not true. 

Decades of inequity show that’s not true, said attorney Mark Rosenbaum, 

"The opponents of desegregation always said, ‘Drop desegregation, and we will put resources into these schools,’" said Mark Rosenbaum, who years ago represented kids of color in L.A.'s desegregation case. "You know, we are still waiting for that to happen."

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