Letitia James and 13 other state AGs push back against Trump administration threats over DEI policies in schools.
Some Croton-Harmon parents and residents have submitted complaints through an "End DEI" portal created to report alleged DEI violations. Our district receives more than $1 million in federal funds.
Yesterday, March 5, a coalition of state attorneys general, led by New York Attorney General Letitia James and the AGs of Massachusetts and Illinois, issued a guidance to institutions of higher education and K-12 schools stating that diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility (DEIA) policies were legal and could not be banned by executive fiats. An accompanying press release from James’s office stated:
"The administration cannot ban diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility efforts with a ‘Dear Colleague’ letter," said Attorney General James. "Schools and educational institutions can rest assured that they are well within their legal rights to continue building inclusive learning environments for their students. My office will always stand up for the rule of law and defend New Yorkers from threats."
The press release and the guidance accused the Trump administration of misinterpreting the law when, on February 14, the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights issued a “Dear Colleague” letter threatening to take action against institutions that allegedly violated new rules against DEIA policies in schools and universities. In particular, the guidance asserts that the administration’s interpretation of a 2023 U.S. Supreme Court decision, Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard, misrepresents what SCOTUS actually said about how race could be taken into account.
Eleven days after the “Dear Colleague” letter was issued, the American Federation of Teachers and the American Sociological Association filed suit against the Trump administration in federal district court in Maryland (see here for the Complaint), asking the court to stop the department from carrying out its threats.
In apparent reaction to the pushback from this lawsuit and other quarters, about a week later the education department issued a FAQ sheet in which it appeared to soften its stance and its definitions of what constituted prohibited DEIA activities. For example, the original letter stated that “Educational institutions have toxically indoctrinated students with the false premise that the United States is built upon ‘systemic and structural racism’ and advanced discriminatory policies and practices.” This was widely interpreted to mean that teachers and professors could no longer teach the history of slavery, the civil rights movement, or the incarceration of Japanese-Americans during World War II.
While the “softened” position continues to prohibit any discrimination or special treatment based on race—consistent with the Supreme Court’s interpretation—the FAQ made clear that programs or events that celebrated specific cultures and groups, such as Black History Month, did not violate the policy as long as all students were allowed to participate.
(This presumably means that our school district’s annual culture night—which will take place on March 28 this year and be called “A Taste of Culture”—does not fall afoul of the federal rules.)
But at the same time, the education department created a whole new controversy by opening a special “End DEI” portal and inviting parents and others to anonymously report their own school districts if they allegedly violated the policies. This immediately brought charges that the department had opened a “snitch line,” which some opponents likened to similar practices by the Nazi regime during the 1930s and 1940s. Other opponents argued that the portal was reminiscent of recent campaigns by conservative groups to intimidate teachers in the south into not telling their students about the history of slavery and the civil rights movement.
In Croton, we estimate based on confidential sources that at least a dozen parents and other anti-DEI residents have already enthusiastically reported the Croton-Harmon school district via the portal for its pro-DEIA policies, some of which are still in draft form and have yet to be adopted by the Board of Education. If the Trump administration turns out to be serious about withholding federal funding, that could be serious for our district: According to Denise Cohen, Assistant Superintendent for Business, “currently, between our school lunch program, Pre-K, and our federal grants, we receive over $1 million in federal funding.”
Of course, this is not the first time that some Croton-Harmon parents have resorted to federal action to try to ban DEIA policies. A lawsuit brought against the district by the conservative group Parents Defending Education, which includes three anonymous Croton-Harmon parents, seeks to prohibit enforcement of some eight current anti-harassment, anti-bullying, and anti-discrimination policies already on the books. That lawsuit, which was originally dismissed without prejudice by a U.S. district judge on technical grounds, is now pending in the Second Circuit Court of Appeals.
Meanwhile, the Trump administration has announced that it intends to ban the Department of Education itself, a long sought goal by the current president. Action to begin that process appears to be imminent as the Chronicle goes to press.
It seems clear that a major battle over DEIA policies, what they mean, and whether attempts to prohibit them will succeed in the courts and elsewhere, is now well underway. The Chronicle will continue to report on these issues as they affect our local community.
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I got a crazy idea, how about we stop the DEI nonsense and keep getting the million dollars? Let's focus on reading, writing and math. Let's do what is best for our children without labeling them as victims or oppressors. History can be taught without doing that. Anyone who grew up in the 80s and 90s knows it.
A great crazy idea Steve, however it will not be embraced by the radical left in NYS which continues to push DEI, Sanctuary Cities, etc. If doing what is best for our children, why did the teachers union lead the way with the policy of closing schools during the COVID pandemic?