After Friday deadline for schools to get rid of DEI
WASHINGTON —
Public schools across the country, from Pre-K to higher education, may now be at risk of losing federal funding if they refuse to get rid of diversity, equity and inclusion programs, following a Friday deadline set by the Trump administration.
The administration is launching a new tool to report alleged violations, as a lawsuit aims to block enforcement.
On Thursday, the Department of Education launched an “End DEI” portal for parents, students, teachers and community members to submit reports of discrimination based on race or sex in publicly-funded K-12 schools. The Trump administration says they’ll use it to identify potential areas for investigation.
“Parents, now is the time that you share the receipts of the betrayal that has happened in our public schools,” said Tiffany Justice, the co-founder of Moms for Liberty, in a statement announcing the portal.
In a “Dear Colleagues Letter” released two weeks ago, the administration accused schools of "routinely using race as a factor in admissions, financial aid, hiring, training, and other institutional programming." It also criticized separate graduation ceremonies for Black and Hispanic students, as well as lessons about systemic and structural racism in the United States.
“The Department will no longer tolerate the overt and covert racial discrimination that has become widespread in this Nation’s educational institutions,” wrote Craig Trainor, the department’s acting assistant secretary for civil rights. “The law is clear: treating students differently on the basis of race to achieve nebulous goals such as diversity, racial balancing, social justice, or equity is illegal under controlling Supreme Court precedent.”
A lawsuit filed Tuesday by the American Federation of Teachers union and the American Sociological Association says the Education Department is applying the Supreme Court decision too broadly. It argues the memo violates free speech rights and could result in a chilling effect.