|
Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...
|
Faced with the potential loss of billions of dollars in federal education funds that are an important revenue source for local districts, New York and 18 other states are suing the Trump administration over its “unprecedented and unlawful requirement” to end diversity, equity, and inclusion practices in schools.
The suit, filed Friday, is a response to an April 3 directive from the U.S. Department of Education informing state education agencies that in order to continue receiving federal funding, they must sign a new certification affirming they will not engage in “illegal” diversity, equity, and inclusion practices. New York and many other states refused to sign the April 3 certification, noting their longstanding commitment to complying with civil rights laws.
The 19 states’ federal court action, led by New York Attorney General Letitia James and the attorneys general of California, Illinois, Massachusetts, and Minnesota, seeks an order declaring the April 3 certification demand unlawful and halting its implementation. It was filed one day after the administration was ordered in separate court actions to pause enforcement of the demand.
“Every student has the fundamental right to learn in an environment that is welcoming and open to everyone,” James said. “The Trump administration is illegally trying to stop efforts that prevent discrimination in our schools, support students with disabilities, and provide resources for students in need while jeopardizing billions of dollars in essential federal education funding.”
In New York, federal funding provides more than $3 billion to the state Education Department, which in turns distributes money to local school districts. James said nearly $1.4 billion in federal Title I funds this fiscal year will go to school districts to provide learning resources for low-income students. Nearly $1 billion, appropriated by Congress under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, helps students with disabilities.
The city school districts in Rochester and Buffalo each receive more than 17 percent of their revenue from federal funds. Data compiled by the National Center for Education Statistics shows most suburban school districts in this region receive millions of dollars in federal funds, often 2 to 5 percent of annual budgets.
In New York, the Board of Regents and state Education Department have supported DEI efforts since 2021. In 2023, they notified all school districts statewide that they were expected to “develop policies and implement practices that advance diversity, equity, and inclusion.”
As the Beacon reported last month, DEI policies in local schools often cover both instruction and hiring. Some 80 percent of students in 11 districts (the city and 10 suburban districts) surveyed by the Beacon attend K-12 schools where job applicants are asked about their commitment to advancing DEI.
Those districts include Brighton, which receives about $2.3 million, or 2 to 3 percent of the district’s annual budget, in federal funds for direct use with its students. Superintendent Kevin McGowan told the Beacon “that’s a huge dollar amount” whose loss would be “a significant problem.”
The April 3 certification demand was not unexpected. Less than 10 days after he was sworn in for a second term, President Donald Trump signed an executive order, “Ending Radical Indoctrination in K-12 Schooling,” that gave the secretary of education 90 days to develop a strategy including steps to block federal funds to K-12 public schools that support the “instruction, advancement, or promotion (of) discriminatory equity ideology” in … “teacher certification, licensing, employment, or training.”
A Feb. 14 advisory letter from the Education Department stated that “K-12 schools have routinely used race as a factor in … hiring, training, and other institutional programming,” adding that some schools use “diversity, equity, and inclusion” programming to justify discriminatory practices. The letter said further legal guidance would follow.
On April 3, when the department issued the certification demand, Craig Trainor, acting assistant secretary for civil rights, said that “federal financial assistance is a privilege, not a right. When state education commissioners accept federal funds, they agree to abide by federal antidiscrimination requirements.”
He added: “Unfortunately, we have seen too many schools flout or outright violate these obligations, including by using DEI programs to discriminate against one group of Americans to favor another based on identity characteristics in clear violation of Title VI” of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Under the Civil Rights Act, programs that receive federal funding cannot discriminate on the basis of race, color and national origin.
The April 3 memo states that “the use of certain DEI practices can violate federal law,” basing its argument in part on the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2023 decision in Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard, which prohibited the use of race as a factor in college admissions. “The continued use of illegal DEI practices may (result in) serious consequences,” including elimination of federal funding and “the potential initiation of litigation for breach of contract by the Department of Justice in connection with civil rights guarantees contained in federal contracts and grant awards seeking to recover previously received funds paid to them under these contracts and grants.”
The memo gave state education agencies 10 days to certify they will not engage in “illegal” DEI programs. The agencies also were ordered to get certifications from all of their local education agencies or draft enforcement plans for those local school districts. The deadline later was extended to April 24.
The suit filed by the 19 states in response contends the certification demand runs afoul of numerous laws. Among them: Title VI of the Civil Rights Act as well as federal laws that prohibit federal interference with state and local education policies. Further, the action claims, the demand also violates the Constitution by withholding funding that Congress appropriated and places unlawful conditions on federal funds.
The attorneys general additionally argue that the Trump administration has failed to define what constitutes an “illegal” DEI practice and has ignored the fact that many programs that support diversity, equity, and inclusion are required by federal civil rights and funding laws.
The orders issued a day earlier to pause enforcement of the certification demand came in separate cases brought by plaintiffs including teachers’ unions and the NAACP. The judge in one of the cases, Landya McCafferty of the Federal District Court in New Hampshire, ruled that the administration was too vague in its use of “diversity, equity and inclusion” and likely was violating the plaintiffs’ free speech rights under the First Amendment.
The judge, who granted a motion for a preliminary injunction, noted that the “loss of federal funding would cripple the operations of many educational institutions.”
Paul Ericson is Rochester Beacon executive editor.
The Beacon welcomes comments and letters from readers who adhere to our comment policy including use of their full, real name. See “Leave a Reply” below to discuss on this post. Comments of a general nature may be submitted to the Letters page by emailing [email protected]
t is Jim Crow, American apartheid by fascist rule. I said it in 2015 and many times since. If you voted for and do not oppose someone supported by the KKK and the American Nazi Party, you are the one that should be deported. It’s a disease of choice.
I do not say DEI, I say Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion now because MAGA has used DEI to make another ‘N’ word. The white wing has made many such words in my years. In the educational setting this means banning books, even in high school and college libraries. It means teaching facts about history such as slavery, the Civil War, the KKK, voting rights, Jim Crow, or the Civil Rights Movement will be labeled DEI discrimination against white people. It means if one is against Trump’s Executive Order rescinding the 1965 addendum to the Civil Rights Act that prohibits discrimination for Federal contracts, denying such contracts only because of a person’s race, sex, or religion, is reverse discrimination In Bizarro world illegal discrimination are equal rights. Standing up to one’s oppressor is not reverse discrimination.
It is Jim Crow, American apartheid by fascist rule. I said it in 2015 and many times since. If you voted for and do not oppose someone supported by the KKK and the American Nazi Party, you are the one that should be deported. It’s a disease of choice.