The National Center for Youth Law (NCYL) and the Council of Parent Attorneys and Advocates (COPAA) filed a federal lawsuit yesterday on behalf of students and families across the country that seeks to reverse the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights’ (OCR) recent decision to effectively stop investigating civil rights complaints. 

“Failing to investigate civil rights complaints is a betrayal of students and families across the country, all of whom deserve justice,” said Shakti Belway, NCYL’s Executive Director. “To abandon thousands of claims, while our schools are seeing increased bullying, harassment, and discrimination, not only goes against the very mission of the Department of Education, it sends a chilling message that schools don’t need to foster an environment in which every student is safe and welcome. This only undermines student safety, while emboldening those who may not have students’ best interests at heart.”

The lawsuit was filed in federal district court in Washington, D.C., on behalf of two parents who have pending claims with the OCR as well as the Council of Parent Attorneys and Advocates (COPAA). It asks the judge to order OCR to continue conducting civil rights investigations, as required by law, and for OCR to provide periodic updates to the court about its efforts to process and investigate civil rights complaints. 

“Secretary McMahon and the Department must be held accountable for harmful actions taken to obstruct families’ access to OCR’s complaint investigation process when discrimination is alleged on the basis of race, sex and the intersection with disability,” stated COPAA’s legal director and co-counsel, Selene Almazan. “It is intolerable that the Administration has taken actions against a backdrop of unveiled hostility towards students of color, LGBTQI+ students and whose race and gender intersect with disability. These nefarious moves jeopardize student safety and may block their access to education programs in schools where they have a right to learn and thrive.”

The lawsuit details how OCR is perverting its core function of supporting all students who face discrimination and/or harassment by pausing investigations into discrimination on the basis of race and sex and intersectional discrimination; incapacitating OCR by gutting its staff; and obstructing families’ access to OCR’s complaint and investigation process. The suit comes in the same week Secretary McMahon laid off hundreds of OCR staff, and provided no information or apparent plan for how student and family rights will be protected. The combination of these actions affect children and disrupt the entire ecosystem designed to provide the evidence base, technical assistance and enforcement needed to assure every child learns. As explained in the lawsuit, OCR’s actions violate the U.S. Constitution’s Equal Protection Clause and the federal Administrative Procedure Act. 

As a result of OCR’s actions, students and families are now denied the basic opportunity to have their discrimination claims heard and investigated. Families with pending complaints have been left in the dark as requests for information or status updates about their cases aren’t answered. OCR has barred its employees from communicating with students, families and schools, meaning that all currently scheduled meetings and mediations have been canceled. This is happening at a time when OCR is receiving an unprecedented number of discrimination complaints each year. Students and families rely on OCR when their local schools or districts are unhelpful or are the perpetrators of discrimination.