Weather 
At first glance, some of the language looks familiar.
A letter sent to state officials in Rhode Island by the Justice Department in June included a reminder that federal civil rights law “prohibits an employer from discriminating against an individual on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, or national origin.”
But that letter is part of a Trump administration initiative that upends 60 years of efforts by the federal government to prevent discrimination against minority groups in the U.S.
Several former Justice Department employees who spoke with CBS News said the department’s focus is shifting: it will seek to protect White people against alleged “reverse discrimination.”
The dramatic shift was crystallized by President Trump’s statement earlier this month in an interview with the New York Times. Trump said civil rights protections and programs have hurt White people.
“I think that a lot of people were very badly treated,” he told the Times. “White people were very badly treated, where they did extremely well and they were not invited to go into a university or a college.”
The Justice Department’s inquiry letter to Rhode Island says it is investigating whether the state is engaging in discrimination in its state government hiring in implementing an affirmative action plan that’s been used nationwide to ensure diverse workforces and student groups.
The Rhode Island inquiry is the latest in a series of probes by the Trump administration’s Justice Department into organizations or governments that use diversity, equity and inclusion programs.
Last week, the agency also filed a lawsuit against Minnesota, in an effort to bring down the state’s affirmative action hiring policies for its agencies. The suit asserts Minnesota law, which mandates affirmative action programs for state civil service, is a violation of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
“We’re seeing a Civil Rights Division that’s really acting on the president’s notion that civil rights laws have harmed White people,” said Jen Swedish, a former attorney in the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division.
“I think the president’s recent statement about reverse discrimination has demonstrated that this administration is focused much more narrowly on White people,” she said.
Swedish said federal laws have long prohibited discrimination against any groups, including White people and people of color. She and other former agency employees who spoke with CBS News said the Trump administration’s focus on targeting and reversing diversity programs appears to be a political decision.
“We are right now operating under a backdrop of a Department of Justice that’s no longer independent from the White House,” said Swedish, who began working in 2025 for the Washington, D.C.-based Justice Connection organization, which helps support thousands of former Justice Department employees with legal representation, employment guidance and mental health assistance, among other services.
A spokesperson for the Justice Department defended the new probes in a statement to CBS News.
“The DEI insanity that took hold of our country over the past decade or so has led to blatant, widespread race and sex discrimination in violation of federal law,” the spokesperson said. “The Civil Rights Division has dozens of active investigations into potentially unlawful discrimination adopted under the guise of diversity, equity, and inclusion. Some of these investigations are public, some aren’t. When we identify violations of federal law, we will not shy away from taking action.”
The Trump administration’s view of reverse discrimination and the prioritizing of these cases by the department is jarring to civil rights advocates who have long championed protections for people of color.
“The president has taken on the effort to mislead the American public and distort the truth and history. His statement is patently false,” said Derrick Johnson, the president of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.
“This is beyond dog-whistle politics when they are playing to the lowest common denominator, denomination of our history, building to white supremacy, when in fact, the problem with what has happened is this false narrative of white supremacy,” Johnson said.
In December, Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights Harmeet Dhillon announced a new rule for handling civil rights cases, eliminating disparate-impact liability from the Civil Rights Act Title VI regulations.
Title VI bans discrimination based on race, color, or national origin in programs that receive federal financial assistance. It’s intended to ensure equal access to benefits and services. Discrimination that’s the result of disparate-impact discrimination occurs “when a seemingly neutral policy or action causes a disproportionate and unjustified negative harm to a group, regardless of intent,” according to the Congressional Research Service. The issue has been the basis of lawsuits involving housing restrictions, lending or age discrimination in hiring and public accommodations for the disabled, among other cases.
In a statement in December, Dhillon accused the Justice Department of a history of “enforcing race- or sex-based quotas or assumptions.” And she said that disparate-impact regulations had “encouraged people to file lawsuits challenging racially neutral policies, without evidence of intentional discrimination.” Rescinding that regulation “will restore true equality under the law by requiring proof of actual discrimination, rather than enforcing race- or sex-based quotas or assumptions,” Dhillon said.
John Wesley, a community activist in Baltimore, told CBS News the changes to the Justice Department’s approach to racial discrimination risks hurting both White people and people of color. Wesley, who previously worked in local Maryland government agencies investigating allegations regarding housing discrimination, said the changes by the Trump administration risk triggering resignations or retirements inside the Justice Department.
He said the departures will hamper the agency’s ability to root out and stop discrimination and unfair practices against all people. Wesley said, “Economically impaired people come in all colors. If we change the protections or reduce them, we will hurt all people.”
A mass departure is already unfolding inside the Justice Department, including its Civil Rights Division.
Swedish and her colleagues at Justice Connection estimate more than 5,000 employees of the Justice Department have departed in the first year of the second Trump administration. She said many of those employees departed because of controversial policy changes and decisions by new agency leaders.
Earlier this month, prosecutors in the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division were told they would not play a role in the ongoing investigation into a fatal shooting of Renee Good in Minneapolis by a federal immigration officer, CBS News previously reported. Swedish told CBS News recent departures inside the Civil Rights Division have been especially consequential.
She said, “Those losses translate in hundreds or thousands of years of experience. These are people who have dedicated their entire lives to enforcing civil rights laws and these constitutional protections. I can’t overstate the value of those employees and the serious consequences of that institutional loss.”
Dhillon has said the agency has been hiring new employees and attorneys to serve in the division. It is unclear if the department’s new mission of combating alleged reverse discrimination will help lure new recruits, or dissuade more from applying.
