YOUR RIGHTS

The infrastructure of civil rights enforcement in the United States was built over six decades. The Civil Rights Division of the DOJ was established in 1957. Executive Order 11246, requiring federal contractors not to discriminate, was signed by LBJ in 1965. Disparate impact liability was established by the Supreme Court in 1971. Title IX was enacted in 1972. The ADA was signed in 1990. Every one of these protections survived every previous administration — Republican and Democratic.

In 14 months, the Trump administration dismantled the enforcement infrastructure from within. Not by repealing the laws — that would require Congress — but by gutting the agencies that enforce them, firing the lawyers who bring cases, redirecting the surviving staff to culture war priorities, and issuing executive orders that effectively nullify the laws' most powerful provisions.

The result: zero sexual assault cases resolved. Zero racial harassment cases resolved. 90% of discrimination complaints dismissed. 60 years of civil rights enforcement — functionally erased.

By May 2025, over 250 lawyers had left the Civil Rights Division — more than 70% of the staff. The criminal section dropped from 40 trial attorneys to 13. The voting rights section operated with bare-bones staff. Two hundred former employees signed an open letter calling the division "destroyed."

The division's mission was flipped. Instead of investigating hate crimes, voter suppression, and police misconduct, it was redirected to investigate transgender athletes, "anti-Christian bias," gun rights, and English-only enforcement. Internal memos ordered a halt to new civil rights cases.

The DOJ withdrew from consent decrees in Minneapolis (George Floyd) and Louisville (Breonna Taylor). Investigations into police departments in Phoenix, Trenton, Memphis, Mount Vernon, Oklahoma City, and Louisiana State Police were closed. All new civil rights investigations into law enforcement were halted.

On April 23, 2025, Trump signed an executive order directing all federal agencies to deprioritize enforcement of disparate impact liability. The doctrine was established in the landmark 1971 Supreme Court case Griggs v. Duke Power Co. and had been used for 54 years to challenge discriminatory hiring tests, lending practices, housing policies, and school discipline disparities.

By ordering agencies not to enforce it, Trump effectively legalized any discriminatory practice as long as the employer, lender, or landlord can claim they didn't intend to discriminate. A hiring algorithm that screens out 90% of Black applicants? Legal, as long as the company says it wasn't on purpose. A lending policy that denies mortgages to Latino neighborhoods at 3x the rate? Legal, as long as the bank points to "neutral" criteria. Most discrimination today is systemic, not intentional — and this order made systemic discrimination unenforceable.

Federal contractors employ approximately 25% of the U.S. workforce. EO 11246 was the only enforceable anti-discrimination requirement for millions of workers whose employers receive taxpayer dollars. Revoking it didn't just eliminate "DEI programs" — it removed the foundational obligation not to discriminate.

The administration then went further: threatening private companies with DOJ and EEOC investigations if they maintained voluntary diversity programs. Companies including Meta, Amazon, McDonald's, Walmart, and Target preemptively gutted their programs. Federal employees were ordered to report colleagues engaged in DEI work — creating a surveillance culture around anti-discrimination efforts.

Biden's Title IX regulations required schools to investigate all reports of sexual violence, protected students from retaliation, and required supportive measures for survivors. Trump's rollback narrowed the definition of harassment, allowed higher evidence standards that make it harder for survivors to win cases, removed requirements to investigate off-campus assaults, and reinstated live cross-examination of accusers — a practice that advocacy groups say traumatizes survivors and deters reporting.

Simultaneously, the OCR was redirected. Instead of investigating racial harassment, disability discrimination, or sexual violence, it pursued "anti-Christian bias" and targeted schools allowing trans students to use facilities matching their gender identity. The office dismissed more than 90% of discrimination complaints in its first months — effectively telling students that the system no longer works for them.