Under Trump, conservatives reignite a battle over race and the Constitution

By Lawrence Hurley, NBC

WASHINGTON — As part of President Donald Trump’s new war on diversity programs, conservatives are renewing a long-running legal battle over the meaning of the Constitution’s guarantee of “equal protection” that dates back to the post-Civil War era.

Trump, as previewed in one executive order purporting to target diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) policies, is seeking in some instances to overturn decades-old policies aimed at protecting and empowering minority groups, both within the federal government and outside.

His administration is also likely to radically change the federal government’s enforcement priorities by using laws enacted during the Civil Rights Movement in the 1950s and ’60s to target diversity programs.

At the same time, conservative groups are pursuing court cases challenging policies they view as unlawfully promoting racial preferences. The Trump administration could throw its weight behind some of those efforts.

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“It’s shocking and appalling what this administration is doing,” said Jin Hee Lee, a lawyer at the Legal Defense Fund, the group that won landmark cases during the civil rights era under the leadership of future Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall.

“I would hope that the Supreme Court, regardless of their ideologies and so forth, would recognize that this is antithetical to the rule of law,” she added.

NBC has more.

This presidency threatens hard-won civil rights.

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