The battle over the future of the Education Department’s civil rights office took another sharp turn this week, as a federal appeals court opened the door for the Trump administration to move forward with sweeping layoffs.
A three-judge panel of the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Boston temporarily suspended an injunction that had forced the department to keep staff in its Office for Civil Rights. That order, issued by District Judge Myong Joun, had demanded reinstatement of positions even after the Supreme Court cleared the way for mass cuts across the agency this summer.
The Justice Department had pressed the appeals court to intervene, arguing that Judge Joun’s refusal to yield to the Supreme Court’s July ruling was a direct affront to the high court’s authority. In that earlier decision, the conservative-majority Supreme Court allowed the government to eliminate 1,300 Education Department jobs—half the agency’s workforce.
Secretary of Education Linda McMahon had announced in March a downsizing plan that would gut the agency, an institution Donald Trump has long called to abolish outright. Congress alone has the power to fully dismantle the department, but the administration’s strategy of deep cuts has already hollowed out its enforcement arms.
The latest injunction centered on the Office for Civil Rights, which investigates discrimination in schools and was bracing to lose nearly 300 of its 550 employees. The narrower case was brought by two students and the Victim Rights Law Center, a group advocating for sexual assault survivors. Judge Joun had described the Supreme Court’s terse July order as “unreasoned,” echoing concerns voiced by other jurists about the Court’s increasingly frequent use of its so-called “shadow docket.”
On Monday, the appeals court sided with the administration for now, stressing that the issues overlapped with the broader case already decided by the Supreme Court. One judge on the panel, Seth Aframe, cautioned that the high court’s cryptic ruling may have only limited weight as the legal fight continues.
For the Education Department’s civil rights staff, the reprieve that once shielded them has now been stripped away, leaving their future uncertain as the cuts loom once again.
