The Justice Department has ordered an immediate halt to all new civil rights cases or investigations — and signaled it may withdraw from Biden-era settlements with police departments that have engaged in discrimination or violence, according to two internal memos sent to staff on Wednesday.
These actions, while expected, represent a sharp turnaround for a department that over the past four years has aggressively investigated high-profile cases of violence and systemic discrimination within local law enforcement and government agencies.
The first of two short memos sent by Chad Mizelle, the department’s chief of staff, ordered a “litigation freeze” in the department’s Civil Rights Division to decide whether Trump appointees want to “initiate further litigation,” according to a screenshot of the document viewed by the New York Times.
Mr. Mizelle also prohibited attorneys working for the division from filing “motions to intervene, agreed remands, amicus briefs, or statements of interest” unless they received approval from senior officials. appointed by Trump. It’s the clearest sign yet that the radical conservatives taking over the department intend to quickly sweep away the previous administration’s liberal agenda.
Perhaps more significantly, a second memo ordered a similar freeze on department activities involving so-called consent decrees – agreements with local governments intended to address faulty policing practices or bias based on race , ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation and disabilities.
“The new administration may wish to reconsider the agreements and consent decrees negotiated and approved under the previous administration,” wrote Mr. Mizelle, an ally of Stephen Miller, Mr. Trump’s top policy adviser.
The order could derail deals recently reached with Louisville, Ky., after the police killing of Breonna Taylor, and with Minneapolis following the killing of George Floyd, according to former administration officials. Neither has received final approval from a federal judge. Other voluntary agreements could also be at risk, they said.
Mr. Trump, who moved quickly to roll back diversity, equity and inclusion programs, has accused President Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s Justice Department of obstructing the police, even though nearly all agencies Law enforcement officials investigated admitted wrongdoing and many embraced the reforms.
In 2020, during his first term, Mr. Trump signed an executive order requiring police departments to ban chokeholds after Mr. Floyd died while being choked.
The president nominated Harmeet K. Dhillon, a conservative lawyer from California, to lead the Civil Rights Division, one of the department’s most important and politically polarizing units. Ms. Dhillon, who will be responsible for voting rights matters if confirmed by the Senate, was a prominent figure in the state’s Republican Party, where she supported Mr. Trump’s false claims of election fraud.
