Seventy-one years after the landmark Brown v. Board of Education decision ended legal segregation in schools, the federal government is reversing civil rights in education. This rollback is evident in two recent executive orders issued by President Trump that target K-12 school discipline and civil rights for Black students and other traditionally underserved students.

On April 23, 2025, President Trump issued executive orders #14280 and #14281. Executive order #14280 takes issue with previous presidential administrations’ guidance to reduce racial disparities in school discipline. Trump’s order directed the Department of Education and the Attorney General to issue guidance to states and districts within 30 days (which has since past) about how to use school discipline in ways that are consistent with the administration’s perspective.

Black girls are 8% of student enrollment but 14% of students suspended. Similarly, Black boys are 8% of enrollment but 18% of students suspended. And Black boys with disabilities are among the most frequently suspended groups.

We can expect the new guidance to reflect the administration’s anti-DEI stance and to endorse, implicitly or explicitly, the use of exclusionary school discipline including suspensions and expulsions. The order also threatens public schools by directing the Secretary of Education to “take appropriate action” against districts that do not comply with the guidance, namely by taking away federal funds, funds that often serve students of color and from low-income backgrounds. This puts districts in the difficult position of complying with the administration’s demands, which may require abandoning race-conscious initiatives, or standing up to the administration’s anti-DEI positions, which could lead to a loss of federal funding.

The second executive order removes a key legal analysis called “disparate impact,” which is often used in school discipline investigations to determine if a race-neutral discipline policy or practice disproportionately harms students of color and other protected student groups. For example, if a district has a suspension policy that appears to be race-neutral or “colorblind” but actually results in more suspensions for Black students, it might be determined that the district is discriminating against Black students regardless of racially motivated intentions. Disparate impact is an important legal tool used to challenge inequitable school discipline policies.

While it is apparent that Black students are punished more frequently and more harshly despite no differences compared to white peers, recent executive orders overlook these inequities and will create obstacles to changing them.

But now, students of color won’t have those protections nor the data to back up their claims, which shows that students of color are more frequently punished in schools. For example, Black girls are 8% of student enrollment but 14% of students suspended. Similarly, Black boys are 8% of enrollment but 18% of students suspended. And Black boys with disabilities are among the most frequently suspended groups, and Black girls with disabilities also experience disproportionately high rates of punishment. White students, on the other hand, are either disciplined at rates comparable to their enrollment or at even lower rates. While it is apparent that Black students are punished more frequently and more harshly despite no differences compared to white peers, recent executive orders overlook these inequities and will create obstacles to changing them.

Importantly, these orders are also part of the administration’s broader strategy to reinterpret civil rights precedent in ways that invert their original purposes, while promoting inaccurate claims of discrimination against white students. Throughout the executive orders, Trump repeatedly characterized earlier reforms to end racial disparities initiated under the Obama and Biden administrations as “discriminatory-equity-ideology-based-school discipline.” This characterization obfuscates, denigrates, and propagandizes legitimate efforts undertaken to protect civil rights of Black students, Latino students, students with disabilities, and LGBTQ+ students in recent years. The administration’s attempts to whitewash disparities will not make disparities go away; instead, it will likely make them worse.

Relatedly, both orders position any race-conscious efforts to mitigate discipline disparities as a form of racial discrimination. In its February 14, 2025 Dear Colleague Letter from the Office for Civil Rights, the administration argues that race-conscious policies are inherently unlawful — an assertion which has been repeatedly debunked by civil rights legal scholars and deemed likely unconstitutional. And yet, these “reverse racism” policies are now in place. In this way, the Trump administration can continue to advance the unfounded claims that race-conscious approaches to ending historically rooted racial discrimination is itself a form of discrimination.

Importantly, these arguments overlook historical and present racial discrimination faced by Black Americans. They harken back to tactics used by white political officials to resist civil rights progress following the Brown decision. Back then, white political leaders in the South sought to undermine civil rights progress and educational opportunities for Black students by passing numerous laws that flat-out defied Brown. That movement, known as “Massive Resistance,” was also one in which exclusionary school discipline was utilized to resist civil rights progress (as were vouchers, another education reform that originated during Massive Resistance). Seven decades later, students of color and other already underserved student groups, may now find themselves being disciplined or expelled at even greater rates than they are currently. It is important to raise awareness about the potential impacts of these executive orders and to act collectively to protect students’ civil rights.

Impacts: Rolling Back Discipline Progress and Inducing Fear

• Administrative Bullying: The Dear Colleague Letter, backed by the executive orders, is widely regarded as an intimidation tactic designed to pressure districts into compliance with the administration’s loose interpretations of discrimination and guidance pertaining to school discipline. While the Trump administration’s authority to enforce these directives is actively being challenged in court, these actions may prompt preemptive changes in districts that could harm students of color and students with disabilities.
• A Return to Exclusionary Discipline: Schools may abandon reforms such as restorative practices or trauma-informed approaches that grew in recent decades with support from the Obama and Biden administrations. This is likely to increase suspensions, expulsions, and other exclusionary discipline practices that disproportionately affect Black students, students with disabilities, and other underserved groups.
• Reducing Legal Tools and Changing Public Understanding of Discrimination: By attacking disparate impact and inverting the public’s general understanding of racial discrimination, these orders aim to eliminate one of the few legal mechanisms for identifying racial discrimination in schools while using propaganda to legitimize unfounded claims of discrimination against white students lending to the administration’s broader efforts to undermine civil rights progress. This will make it harder to protect the civil rights of Black students and other underserved students.

What You Can Do: Local Action is Critical

• Demand alternatives to exclusionary discipline and civil rights protections for Black and Latino students and other underserved groups: Call your local school principals, school board members, and state officials to demand inclusive alternatives to exclusionary school discipline and commitments to protecting the civil rights of Black students and other underserved student groups, including students with disabilities.
• Encourage districts against pre-complying out of fear: Use resources like this letter from the Federal School Discipline and Climate Coalition and this one from the Education Civil Rights Alliance to talk with education leaders about maintaining positive school discipline, climate, and equity-oriented programming. Remember: executive orders are not law.
• Build local coalitions: Partner with civil rights groups, youth and family organizations, and advocacy coalitions to coordinate responses, build shared strategies, and advocate for inclusive disciplinary alternatives and elimination of racial disparities. Create fact sheets, host webinars, and distribute materials to help school staff and community members understand what these EOs do — and don’t — mean.
• Monitor state and local policy changes: Proactively support candidates and legislation that will maintain inclusive alternatives to exclusion, end racial disparities, and protect the civil rights of Black and Latino students and other underserved groups. Hold officials accountable.

The Trump administration’s executive orders mark a dangerous regression in education equity. Disguised as efforts to restore order and fairness, these directives attempt to reauthorize the exclusion of Black and Latino students and other underserved student groups from educational opportunity. But history shows us that people have resisted before — and can again. By speaking out, organizing locally, protecting state-level rights, and telling the truth about what’s happening in our schools, we can push back against this new era of white Massive Resistance. The future of equitable education depends on what we do next.

 Dr. Kathryn E. Wiley is assistant professor of education in the School of Education at Howard University.