How Trump is using civil rights agency to push a MAGA obsession with white people

Established via the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) was among the many achievements of President Lyndon B. Johnson's Great Society. The EEOC has existed under 11 different U.S. presidents, including Donald Trump — whose critics argue that the agency, under Chair Andrea R. Lucas, is taking a radically different approach from what LBJ envisioned during the 1960s. And according to National Public Radio (NPR), that includes pushing MAGA's obsession with eliminating DEI (diversity, equity and inclusion) programs from the workplace.

NPR's Andrea Hsu, in an article published on March 31, stresses that the Trump-era EEOC is very much "at odds with" its original LBJ-era mission.

"The EEOC was established through Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 as Congress sought to remedy the vast racial injustices faced by Black Americans," Hsu explains. "At its peak in the early 1980s, the agency had more than 3000 employees. Today, it's down to about 1740 employees, according to the Office of Personnel Management, with hundreds of departures since President Trump returned to the White House last year…. Under Lucas' leadership, staff members have continued to work through tens of thousands of discrimination complaints, recovering money for women who have been sexually harassed on the job, Black people denied work opportunities and — under the Americans with Disabilities Act — workers denied accommodations by their employers, among other such common cases."

The NPR reporter continues, "But former leaders of the agency say Lucas is also using its increasingly scarce resources to pursue an agenda at odds with its traditions and even its mandate. In addition to the cases challenging DEI, they point to the agency's decision to dismiss multiple lawsuits it was fighting on behalf of transgender and nonbinary individuals, its reversal of earlier decisions establishing protections for transgender workers and the rollback of its comprehensive harassment guidance."

One of Lucas' critics is Charlotte Burrows, who chaired the EEOC under former President Joe Biden and was fired by Trump.

Burrows told NPR that "there's a real radical effort to advance one ideological perspective with the resources" that EEOC presently has — adding, "Civil rights enforcement should never be a partisan political game."

In a video posted on X, formerly Twitter, on December 17, 2025, Lucas declared, "Are you a white male who's experienced discrimination at work based on your race or sex? You may have a claim to recover money under federal civil rights laws. Contact the EEOC as soon as possible."

Democrat Chai Feldblum, a former EEOC official, said of Lucas' anti-DEI efforts, "It is frightening employers from taking positive actions in their workplaces, and it is failing to help those people whom the law actually requires them to help. This is not helpful in terms of stopping discrimination — real discrimination — in our country."