Justice Department freezes all cases in Civil Rights Division
Demonstrators demand justice for Breonna Taylor as they gather in Jefferson Square Park on March 13, 2021, in Louisville, Kentucky. (Photo by Joshua Lott/The Washington Post)
The Justice Department has ordered its Civil Rights Division to halt all ongoing litigation from the Biden administration and not pursue new cases or settlements, according to a memo sent to the temporary head of the division that was obtained by The Washington Post.
The letter instructs Kathleen Wolfe—designated by the Trump administration as supervisor of the division—to ensure that civil rights attorneys do not file “any new complaints, motions to intervene, agreed-upon remands, amicus briefs, or statements of interest.”
A separate memo sent to Wolfe on Wednesday says the Civil Rights Division must notify the Justice Department’s chief of staff of any consent decrees the division has finalized within the last 90 days. That directive suggests that police-reform agreements the Justice Department has negotiated with cities including Minneapolis, Louisville and Memphis could be in jeopardy.
The first memo doesn’t state how long the freeze will last, but it essentially shuts down the Civil Rights Division for at least the early weeks of the Trump administration. Harmeet K. Dhillon, a Republican lawyer and activist who is President Donald Trump’s nominee to lead the department, is awaiting Senate confirmation.
The Justice Department could not immediately be reached for comment about the memo, which was sent by Chad Mizelle, the department’s new chief of staff.
It states that officials are implementing the freeze to be “consistent with the Department’s goal of ensuring that the Federal Government speaks with one voice in its view of the law and to ensure that the President’s appointees or designees have the opportunity to decide whether to initiate any new cases.”
Within the Justice Department, the Civil Rights Division typically experiences the sharpest shift in priorities between Republican and Democratic administrations. Department officials interviewed after the November election said they expected that change to be even more drastic between the Biden and Trump administrations.
But the division typically decides on a case-by-case basis what litigation to pursue from the previous administration.
“It’s beyond unusual -it’s unprecedented. We’ve never seen this before at this scale with any transfer of power, regardless of the ideology of any incoming president or administration,” said Damon Hewitt, president and executive director of the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law. “This should make Americans both angry and deeply worried. This is more than just a changing course of philosophy—this is exactly what most people [in the civil rights community] feared: a Justice Department that was created to protect civil rights literally abdicating its duty and responsibility to protect Americans from all forms of discrimination.”
In all, the Justice Department launched a dozen investigations into state and local law enforcement agencies during President Joe Biden’s tenure. They issued findings in nine of them. But Biden’s administration was slow to lock in reform agreements, putting a major civil rights initiative in jeopardy.
After the November election, the Justice Department rushed to finalize at least some police reform agreements, knowing that such agreements could be opposed by Trump appointees.
In December, the department announced a federal oversight agreement with the city of Louisville, where the 2020 police killing of Breonna Taylor helped spark nationwide justice protests. In early January, the Civil Rights Division forged a police accountability plan with city leaders in Minneapolis, where the police killing of George Floyd galvanized the nationwide protests even further. Neither has been approved by a judge.
Trump did not pursue similar police accountability investigations during his first term in the White House. As a candidate in this year’s election, he clearly signaled his intent to abandon Biden’s use of federal power to try to curb excessive police force and racial discrimination.
He said on the campaign trail that police at times must be “extraordinarily rough” to stamp out urban mayhem, and endorsed more aggressive tactics from police, including the use of stop-and-frisk to search suspects.
Updated with details throughout on Jan. 23.
Caroline O’Donovan contributed to this report.
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