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‘Stay tuned’: Civil rights groups prepare to take on Trump’s DEI ‘distortion campaign’

Civil rights leaders are still grappling with the weight of President Donald Trump’s swift and sweeping executive orders eliminating diversity, equity and inclusion and rolling back decades-old policies meant to guard Black and brown Americans from racial discrimination. But while many are contemplating and strategizing, it’s clear that civil rights groups aren’t going to take the orders lying down. “Stay tuned,” Marc Morial, president of the National Urban League, told theGrio when asked about legal action the organization and others […]

January 27, 2025

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Trump’s new Justice Department leadership orders a freeze on civil rights cases

President Donald Trump’s new Justice Department leadership has put a freeze on civil rights litigation and suggested it may reconsider police reform agreements negotiated by the Biden administration, according to two memos obtained Wednesday by The Associated Press. Attorneys in the department’s Civil Rights Division were ordered not to file any new complaints, amicus briefs or other certain court papers “until further notice,” one of the memos said. Another memo directed attorneys to notify leadership of any settlements or consent decrees — […]

January 26, 2025

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Trump’s dismantling of EEOC and Civil Rights Act enforcement will have chilling effect for Black workers

Civil rights leaders and elected officials are seething after President Donald Trump signed a series of executive orders to eliminate DEI federal programs and decades-old enforcement of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Advocates and legal experts say one order, which revokes the enforcement of equal employment opportunity laws, also known as Title VII under the Civil Rights Act, will have a chilling effect. “We got a lot of people who are going to lose their jobs,” said Dr. Mary […]

January 22, 2025

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Civil rights leaders won’t let Trump inauguration overshadow Dr. King’s true dream of racial justice

As Donald Trump takes the oath of office and is sworn in for a second time as president of the United States, the nation is also observing the federal holiday that honors Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s contributions to the nation and the world. The civil rights leader transformed America’s consciousness and was an architect of a movement that dismantled U.S. laws sanctioning racial segregation and oppression. On MLK Day, civil rights leaders are reflecting on the day’s ironic juxtaposition […]

January 20, 2025

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Jimmy Carter’s life intersected with slavery’s legacy. His record on Civil Rights is complicated

Young Jimmy Carter and his friends were walking across a pasture after a day’s farm labor during the Great Depression. As they came to a gate, his companions stood aside and let Carter enter first. This was no act of kindness or intuitive deference to a future U.S. president. The teens stopped because they were Black, and James Earl Carter Jr. was white, a 14-year-old whose father owned the Georgia land they all worked. After years of playing and working […]

January 9, 2025

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Civil rights group’s lawsuit using Ku Klux Klan Act is last hope of holding Trump accountability for Jan. 6

One of the nation’s leading civil rights groups is fighting to hold President-elect Donald Trump accountable for his role in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol. “We have to decide, as a nation, do we want to allow that type of racialized political violence to be normalized and to go unaccounted for,” said Damon Hewitt, president and executive director of Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law. The civil rights organization is leading the civil lawsuit, Smith […]

January 7, 2025 1

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Former President Jimmy Carter, a proponent for Black civil rights, dead at 100

Jimmy Carter, the 39th president of the United States and longest-lived former commander-in-chief, has died at the age of 100. In February of this year, Carter made the decision to begin in-home hospice care without further medical treatment for brain cancer. Carter was diagnosed in 2015 and initially recovered from the cancer before it later returned. In November, Carter notably achieved his goal of living long enough to cast his ballot for Vice President Kamala Harris in the 2024 presidential […]

December 29, 2024

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Trump’s DOJ pick ignites alarm among Black leaders: ‘Civil rights enforcement will be under attack from within’

Civil rights leaders are decrying President-elect Donald Trump’s nominee to lead the Department of Justice Civil Rights Division, Harmeet Dhillon, and the implications for Black communities and other marginalized groups.As assistant attorney general of the civil rights office, Dhillon, a conservative attorney, will have the authority to enforce — or not — federal statutes related to discrimination based on race, sex, disability, religion, or national origin. Given Trump’s pronouncements, Project 2025‘s proposals, and Dhillon’s legal record, the Civil Rights Division […]

December 11, 2024

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‘It is on and poppin’: Leaders prepare for battle against Trump administration hostile to civil rights

During his first and successful run for president in 2016, Donald Trump asked Black Americans, “What do you have to lose?” Lawyers and civil rights leaders say they stand to lose a lot in Trump’s second presidential administration. In anticipation of what Trump has already vowed to do, groups are gearing up for a fight to prevent the further erosion of civil rights under the president-elect’s incoming second administration. “It is on and poppin’ and not in a good way,” said […]

November 26, 2024