The face of diversity, equity and inclusion continues to change with a recent victory by Chicago Women in Trades. A judge granted CWIT a temporary restraining order on March 27 in its case against President Donald Trump’s anti-DEI executive orders.
Initially, the nonprofit, which seeks to amplify the presence of tradeswomen in their industries, filed a lawsuit on Feb. 26 against Trump, the U.S. Department of Labor, then-Acting Secretary of Labor Vincent Micone, the Office of Budget Management, its Director Russell Vought, the U.S. Department of Justice and Attorney General Pam Bondi. The issue at hand was funding.
According to CWIT, Trump failed to properly define DEI in his Jan. 20 and Jan. 21 executive orders, thus putting CWIT’s funding — particularly for bolstering the presence of Black and Latina women in the trades — at risk.
“The anti-diversity EOs declare all diversity, equity, and inclusion programs illegal, and identify the lengths to which the federal government will go to end them,” the complaint read. “But the anti-diversity EOs offer no explanation as to what types of programs to promote diversity, equity, and inclusion ‘violate any applicable Federal anti-discrimination laws,’ or how.”
The temporary restraining order and its parameters
The judge ruled that CWIT would be likely to succeed on “the merits of its First Amendment claims involving the Termination Provision and the Certification Provision,” and that CWIT demonstrated irreparable harm.
In the original complaint, CWIT stated that the “inability to provide education, training, support, and guidance for women in trades” would be “immeasurable,” and ultimately damage the trades industry and the national workforce as a whole.
“The balance of equities favors CWIT because of the severity of a First Amendment injury, because the government can still enforce the provisions of the Executive Orders that are unlikely to violate the First Amendment, and because the government can still enforce existing anti-discrimination laws,” the judge said.
So as a part of the temporary restraining order granted, which is for now 28 days, the DOL is temporarily enjoined from canceling or pausing any of CWIT’s grants. The government is also barred from Federal Claims Act enforcement against CWIT on this basis.
What happens next?
“Now, our focus turns to seeking a preliminary and eventually a permanent injunction to fully safeguard CWIT from being targeted for its work to promote diversity, equity, and inclusion for women in the skilled trades,” Sabrina Talukder, senior counsel with the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law’s Economic Justice Project, said in a statement.
Highlighting the need for nonprofits like CWIT to create a “level playing field,” Talukder said that CWIT is “still at risk of being unjustly silenced and defunded. Everyday Americans stand to lose if nonprofits doing the critical work of advancing gender and racial equity cannot continue their work.”
HR Dive reached out to Chicago Women in Trades but did not hear back by the time of publication.
