After monthlong pause, Trump admin resumes investigating disability complaints at schools
For students with disabilities, time is of the essence. A prompt federal intervention can make the difference between them going back to school soon – or staying home and missing out indefinitely.
WASHINGTON – When President Donald Trump took office again, the work of the federal office that investigates disability-related discrimination in U.S. schools quickly ground to a halt.
Cases that had been progressing toward mediation or a resolution with school districts were abruptly canceled with no explanation, according to advocates.
Denise Marshall, the CEO of the Council of Parent Attorneys and Advocates, a disability rights group, has been fielding worries from parents around the country about it over the past month. In recent weeks, she said staffers at the Education Department's Office for Civil Rights who'd been assigned to investigate students' situations halted communications altogether.
“They were very concerned,” she said.
The Trump administration lifted the pause on Feb. 20, according to an internal memo and an agency spokesperson. Much of the rest of the work of the branch, which plays a key role in curbing discrimination against students and teachers, remains largely in limbo, current and former officials said.
Investigators have resumed looking into complaints that allege just disability-based discrimination, according to the memo, which was signed by Craig Trainor, the acting assistant secretary for civil rights. But advocates say they're worried complaints alleging prejudice on multiple fronts, not just based on disability, will stay on hold.
“You can’t parse out disability from race, from gender,” Marshall said.
When a new president is elected, it’s typical for the Education Department’s civil rights arm to temporarily halt some of its operations for a few weeks or months while the Oval Office shifts its policy priorities. But in the past, the bulk of its least controversial grunt work – including investigating disability-related discrimination, which makes up the lion’s share of the cases it handles – largely hasn’t been impacted.
When the second Trump administration began, former officials and advocates said staffers in the civil rights office saw an unconventional pause. Catherine Lhamon, who headed up the division during the Biden administration, said the office “had its hands tied behind its back,” as high-ranking new officials told staff they had to cease contact with students’ parents and school principals.
“That is devastating to me, as the former chief civil rights enforcer for our nation’s schools,” she said. “And it’s devastating to me as a mom.”
Ray Li, an attorney who worked in the division under Lhamon, said his former colleagues “feel really bad and totally hamstrung.”
In a statement, Julie Hartman, an agency spokesperson, said the hold on processing complaints alleging disability-related discrimination was lifted on Feb. 20. She said the Biden administration's Education Department took even longer to lift a pause on disability-related investigations. Biden took office in January 2021, and she said cases resumed on March 10 of that year.
Public resolution agreements and a database show the Biden-era civil rights office was, in fact, resolving disability-related complaints during that period. The Trump administration has not announced any case resolutions yet this year.
Disabled students often turn to the Education Dept. for help
School-based discrimination complaints have been on the rise for years. In fiscal year 2024, the Education Department fielded the highest volume in its history. Amid massive protests related to the Israel-Hamas war, the agency saw a “marked proliferation of reported hate incidents in schools,” per its latest annual report.
Yet the majority of discrimination cases each year are related to people with disabilities. Over time, they’ve come to take up roughly 50 to 60% of the civil rights office’s caseload, Lhamon said.
One case during her tenure involved a blind parent, who needed his school district to move the bus drop-off location so he could safely pick up his children. In another instance, a school tried to unlawfully police where a kindergartner could bring their wheelchair. A different school district triggered an investigation during the Biden years by posing an arbitrary cap on the number of students with disabilities it could accept annually.
Under federal law, students with disabilities are entitled to a “free and appropriate” public education. Schools are required to meet their needs adequately enough so they can learn as well as their peers.
When schools fail to provide the right accommodations, families without the means to file costly lawsuits often turn to the Education Department for help.
“Our members use the Office for Civil Rights quite regularly,” Marshall said.
For students with disabilities, time is of the essence. A prompt federal intervention can make the difference between them going back to school soon – or staying home and missing out indefinitely.
“When a kid isn’t getting accommodations they need, they can’t access educational materials,” Li said. “That’s a huge problem, and it isn’t something that (the office) can sit on and wait for a year to resolve.”
Future of civil rights office uncertain
Over the last month, the Trump administration has opened several new civil rights cases. Taken together, they signal a marked shift in its agenda to enforce discrimination prevention in schools.
A Denver school district is being investigated because it has a gender-neutral bathroom. Ivy League colleges are being reviewed over allegations of antisemitism. Maine’s state department of education is also the target of a new probe, based on allegations that some transgender athletes were involved in school sports. That review was opened shortly after the president got into a highly publicized spat with Maine’s Democratic governor about the issue last week.
Yet the future of the Office for Civil Rights is uncertain. It has long been understaffed relative to its workload, which has caused a significant backlog of cases. Dozens of staffers took recent buyouts offered by the Trump administration, according to Lhamon. Others were placed on paid leave because they participated in diversity, equity and inclusion trainings (emails obtained by Paste BN show a training that prompted suspensions was encouraged by Education Department leaders during Trump’s first term).
Meanwhile, Trump continues to threaten he'll dismantle the Education Department entirely, though he lacks the authority to follow through on that promise. Congressional lawmakers have floated legislation inspired by Project 2025, a blueprint for Trump's presidency touted by conservatives, to break up the civil rights office. That plan would shift part of it to the Justice Department while moving disability rights enforcement to the Department of Health and Human Services.
Linda McMahon, Trump’s Education secretary nominee who is expected to be confirmed by the U.S. Senate on Monday, appeared open to those ideas at her confirmation hearing.
“I’m not sure that it’s not better served in HHS,” she said two weeks ago, referencing federal protections for students with disabilities. “But I don’t know.”
While McMahon stressed that funding for students with disabilities won't be impacted by plans to dismantle the Education Department, critics say a massive reshuffling would cost kids who are struggling time they don’t have.
Dan Stewart, the managing attorney for education and employment at the National Disability Rights Network, said he worries about a “snowball effect” from all the tumult.
“The more chaos, the more uncertainty, the more staff layoffs or potential staff layoffs, the less likely it is for complaints to be processed, and for parents and children to get answers,” he said.
Zachary Schermele is an education reporter for Paste BN. You can reach him by email at zschermele@usatoday.com. Follow him on X at @ZachSchermele and Bluesky at @zachschermele.bsky.social.