Trump's Trials - Premier U.S. civil rights agency dismantles tools to fight discrimination

Episode Date: June 5, 2026

As part of a realignment of civil rights enforcement under President Trump, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission is seeking to end its annual data collection while also getting rid of a 1979 regulation that allowed employers to take certain steps to address race and gender imbalances revealed by the data. NPR's Andrea Hsu reports. Support NPR and hear every episode of Trump's Terms sponsor-free with NPR+. Sign up at plus.npr.org.See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

You're listening to Trump's terms. I'm Scott Detrow. Every episode, we bring you one story from NPR's recent coverage of the 47th president. With a focus on ways his administration is pushing the boundaries of presidential power. Here's the latest from NPR. I'm Michelle Martin in Washington, D.C. The Trump administration wants to end a requirement for large and mid-sized companies to disclose their workers' race, ethnicity, and gender. The rule, in place since 1966, is meant to root out discrimination in hiring and promotions. But priorities at the nation's premier civil rights agency have changed.

And P.S. Andrea Shue reports. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission began gathering demographic data at the height of the civil rights era, a time when... Black workers tended to be congregated in the less skilled general laborer jobs. And not the higher skilled positions. That would be better paid. that would lead toward advancement and managerial opportunities. Carla Gilbred was at the EEOC during the Biden administration. Over decade, she says the data has played a key role in holding employers accountable.

It's one of the first things that you can look at as you're trying to learn more. About why, say, there are so few women or black people in leadership at a certain company. But now the EEOC has given the White House a proposal to stop collecting the data altogether. What's more, the agency also wants to overturn a 1979 rule, one that allowed companies to take temporary steps to hire, say, more women or black people, if the data revealed an imbalance. High Feldblum served as a commissioner under President Obama. So this is the EOC giving employers the roadmap of how they can take race and gender into account in a positive way and not violate the law that says you cannot discriminate on the

basis of race or sex. But President Trump's EEOC is not okay with that roadmap. Agency chair Andrea Lucas has repeatedly argued that race or sex should never influence employment decisions. On social media, she called on white men to come forward if they think they've been denied opportunities because of their race or sex. And she's going after companies she thinks have crossed the line. In an interview with NPR earlier this year, she said the rules are the same for everyone, no matter who's the victim, who's the oppressor. Those terms don't matter based on race. If you were being treated differently based on race, the exact same rules apply to you.

Lucas elaborated on that point at the Fortune Workplace Innovation Summit last month. She argued her agency exists to ensure equal opportunity, not equitable outcomes. Are you going to say that the solution is a perpetual, victim complex, where the reason someone should have rights is because they were victimized previously. She called that an ugly version of our country. Regardless of what has happened before, the way to stop discriminating based on race is to stop discriminating based on race. The end, full stop. But getting rid of the 1979 rule won't actually be the end. A pair of Supreme Court precedents stand in the way. These decades-old rulings found employers could give preferential treatment to people,

of color and women to address underrepresentation as long as it was temporary and didn't create an absolute barrier for white people or men. Feldblum says those landmark decisions remain good law, but for how long she's not sure. I think the Supreme Court is just waiting for a case that might allow them to overturn those two important cases. And the way things are going at the EEOC, such a case could already be in the pipeline. Andrew Issu and PR News. And before we wrap up, a thank you to our NPR Plus supporters who hear each show without sponsored messages and, of course, who help protect independent journalism. If you are not a supporter yet, you can visit plus.npr.org to find out how you can get a ton of podcast perks across dozens of NPR shows, like bonus episodes, exclusive merchandise, and more. Again, that's plus.npr.org. I'm Scott Detrow. Thanks for listening to Trump's terms.

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