Attorney General Kwame Raoul, as part of a coalition of 20 attorneys general, is suing the Trump administration over its attempts to purge “diversity, equity and inclusion” from federal contracting.
The suit comes in response to what it describes as the “rushed implementation” of a March executive order from Trump that seeks to prohibit federal contractors, including state agencies, from engaging in “racially discriminatory DEI activities.”
That executive order also threatens to ban violators from receiving any federal funding in the future. And it exposes those violators to potential legal action through an alleged “false claim,” while requiring states to create lists of “potential” violators.
The attorneys general argue that in repealing a decades-old executive order by then-President Lyndon B. Johnson prohibiting racial discrimination, and also by adding new rules, the federal government is trying to compel states to break federal antidiscrimination laws.
And, they said the administration’s effort to change contracting rules circumvented federal processes laid out in the Administrative Procedure Act.
“The president’s executive order has sowed confusion among federal contractors who for decades have adhered to settled antidiscrimination policies,” Raoul said. “I will continue to take a stand against the administration’s efforts to scrap lawful diversity, equity and inclusion policies where those efforts, if successful, would turn back the clock on all of the hard-fought progress we as a country have made toward equity.”
Attorneys general for California, Colorado, Connecticut, Washington D.C., Hawaii, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, Virginia, Washington and Wisconsin all signed onto the lawsuit.
“The [Trump administration] have not adequately explained their reasons for adopting the new contract terms, nor have they explained what the contract terms mean or require from contractors, or how they differ from other antidiscrimination requirements previously and currently applicable to federal contractors,” the suit reads.
Their point of contention mirrors the winning argument of another coalition of attorneys general — also including Raoul — that successfully sued the Trump administration over an attempted ban on gender affirming care for trans youth nationwide.
In March, a federal judge in Oregon ruled that Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. didn’t go through the proper administrative procedures in December when issuing the declaration, which warned doctors that they could be excluded from federal health programs like Medicare and Medicaid if they provide these treatments.
It’s the latest in a series of legal victories for legal coalitions Raoul has joined in opposing Trump’s policies.
In September, Raoul and another coalition of legal officials won a lawsuit seeking the release of $2 billion in federal disaster relief funding that had been held up by the Trump administration over sanctuary city policies. Two months later, a different federal judge released federal transportation funding in response to another suit from a similar group after the Trump administration attempted to block that money over immigration enforcement.
And earlier this year, in response to another suit from Raoul and other legal officials, a federal appeals court ruled to restore medical research funding cut by the Trump administration.