Labor & Employment Law Daily Wrap Up, LITIGATION NEWS, TRENDS—Teachers union sues over threat of federal funding withdrawal for DEI use, (Feb 26, 2025)
According to the complaint, the Department of Education “…appears to ban all programming in support of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion…despite the fact that such programming is lawful.”
In a lawsuit filed in a Maryland federal district court on February 25, the American Federation of Teachers (AFT), the American Sociological Association (ASA), and the American Federation of Teachers-Maryland (AFT-Maryland), allege that the Department of Education (DOE) has unlawfully threatened to withdraw federal funding from schools that use Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI), and other diversity practices in their policies, programming, and organizations. The complaint stems from a letter, known as a Dear Colleague letter, send by the DOE Office of Civil Rights, on February 14, that requires the stoppage of all school programs and policies that use diversity and other DEI programs within two weeks.
DOE stance. According to the DOE, some of the programs and practices schools are using, such as DEI, not requiring admissions tests, and using cues from student application essays to determine backgrounds, appear neutral but are motivated by racial considerations, in violation of federal law. The 2023 U.S. Supreme Court decision in Students for Fair Admissions, Inc. (SFFA) is used as justification for the contents of the letter. The DOE writes that school “…programs discriminate in less direct, but equally insidious, ways. DEI programs, for example, frequently preference certain racial groups….” Educational institutions are advised to cease all efforts to circumvent prohibitions on the use of race by relying on proxies or other indirect means to accomplish such ends; and to stop reliance on third-party contractors, clearinghouses, or aggregators that are “being used by institutions in an effort to circumvent prohibited uses of race.” On funding, the DOE states that it intends to act appropriately to assess compliance with the applicable statutes and regulations beginning no later than 14 days from the date of the letter (February 28), including antidiscrimination requirements that are a condition of receiving federal funding.
Lawsuit. The AFT, ASA, and AFT-Maryland argue that the DOE letter prohibits speech and is vague, in violation of the First and Fifth Amendments, and that it misinterprets the Supreme Court’s SFFA decision, and that the DOE has overreached its authority. The complaint notes, “…the Supreme Court has not banned efforts to advance diversity, equity and inclusion in education.” The complaint asks the court to stop the DOE from enforcing the letter through a preliminary injunction, and to declare the letter unlawful.
The case is No. 1:25-cv-00628-SAG.
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