Top Virginia cities in the hot seat as Trump-aligned group demands DOJ probe of DEI mandates

FIRST ON FOX: A Trump-aligned legal group is ramping up its pressure campaign targeting big blue cities violating President Donald Trump’s Executive Orders and federal civil rights law by continuing to embed diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) into their practices. 

America First Legal (AFL) sent three more civil rights complaints to the Department of Justice’s Office of Civil Rights this week requesting it investigate the Virginia cities of Richmond, Alexandria and Arlington for violating Title VI and Title VII of the Federal Civil Rights Act of 1964, as well as Trump’s Executive Orders on discriminatory DEI initiatives, via its city and county programs, hiring, and public services. 

AFL argues the cities receive federal grant money and distribute it across their city governments in various departments and for multiple purposes, opening them up to federal scrutiny.  

The civil rights complaint letters to the Justice Department follow the agency’s decision to launch an investigation into the city of Austin for similar DEI violations, which was followed by AFL’s first complaint letter to the Justice Department’s Office of Civil Rights earlier this month, asking the agency to investigate Seattle over its allegedly discriminatory DEI practices. AFL filed a complaint against Portland a few days later as well, alleging similar accusations.   

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“Despite these federal civil rights laws, these jurisdictions openly engage in Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (“DEI”) policies in their respective jurisdictions, ordering local departments to implement discriminatory ‘equity’ programs and directives,” an AFL press release states. “Race-based policies do not create justice—they destroy it. As Virginia lurches to the Left, America First Legal will continue leading the fight to ensure that federal funds never support programs that divide citizens, weaken public safety, or erode the rule of law.”

In AFL’s complaint, the legal watchdog accuses the City of Richmond of creating a “government-wide pattern or practice of discrimination” by embedding racial equity in every department. The complaint cites hiring materials embedded with discriminatory themes, mandatory DEI training, Richmond’s Equity Agenda, and the capital city’s establishment of an Office of Equity and Inclusion, which AFL claims to have an aim to empower “only certain people and communities wholly based on race,” rather than merit.

Richmond’s fiscal year budgets reportedly measured department performance by the percentage of employees completing “equity training,” with a stated goal of 100% participation. Meanwhile, AFL also cited Richmond’s “Climate Equity Action Plan” and “Racial Equity and Environmental Justice (REEJ) program,” which the group accuses of funneling resources to only certain racial groups. 

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The civil rights complaints against Alexandria and Arlington include similar allegations to those levied against Richmond.

Alexandria’s Office of Race and Social Equity (RASE), AFL alleges, serves to embed “racial and social equity into all city policies, programs, decisions, and environments” and ensure city policies and programs “are discussed and evaluated through a racial and social justice lens.”

In particular, AFL calls out Alexandria’s Police Department’s development of a “Racial Equity Plan,” which the complaint claims has instructions for the police department “to make efforts in creating a diverse workforce” with the goal of “improv[ing] the demographic representation” through recruitment. A similar “strategic plan” from the city’s fire department reportedly pushes similar hiring preferences on its department as well, AFL alleges.

Arlington, meanwhile, is accused of establishing an “Affirmative Action Plan,” which AFL says includes “underutilization goals” based on race for specific job groups. These goals include increasing minority representation in the “Senior Administrators” job group from 35.23% to 45%, and minority representation in “Police Officers” from 27.38% to 38%, according to AFL’s complaint.

To prove the real-life consequences of these cities’ policies, AFL’s complaint against Arlington pointed to an incident at a local public school from last year.

“In September 2024, a male sex offender was permitted to use the girls’ locker room at Washington Liberty High School in Arlington County for months because he claimed to be transgender—a direct result of the County’s policy allowing individuals to use facilities based on their claimed ‘gender identity.’ The individual ultimately exposed his genitals to a 9-year-old girl,” AFL’s complaint to the Department of Justice chronicles. “This incident demonstrates how Arlington County’s race- and sex-conscious policies not only violate federal civil rights law but also compromise student safety.”

Last month, AFL reached a settlement with the City of Philadelphia that began in 2019 over alleged race- and sex-based quotas and “discriminatory” union-membership requirements in public contracting. Under the settlement, the City of Philadelphia agreed to rewrite its “Project Labor Agreements,” which AFL said penalized city contractors that refused to abide by its DEI mandates. Under the settlement, the city was compelled to make previous workforce diversity goals “strictly aspirational” and end “quotas or mandatory minimums.”