Mayor Brandon Scott says Baltimore will continue to fight Trump's DEI executive orders

Madisson Weyrich, Baltimore Sun on Feb 22, 2025

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BALTIMORE — A day after a federal judge sided with Baltimore City and agreed to at least temporarily block a Trump administration order seeking to ban diversity, equity and inclusion programs, Mayor Brandon Scott vowed to continue the fight “with every legal tool available.”

“Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion efforts were never about providing opportunities to unqualified individuals but about ensuring that qualified individuals from diverse backgrounds were not passed over for those less qualified who met the status quo,” Scott said in a statement posted on X/Twitter on Saturday.

“President (Donald) Trump’s executive orders are not only unconstitutional but also clearly oppose our country’s values. His relentless attacks on DEI initiatives seek to dismantle the very principles that make our nation strong.”

Trump’s orders on Jan. 20 and 21 closed federal diversity offices, launched investigations of DEI programs and slashed federal workers.

Baltimore and Scott are suing President Donald Trump and several federal departments to block the orders. Other plaintiffs include diversity officers, university professors and restaurant workers. Their 42-page federal lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Maryland, says the DEI orders issued during the first 100-hour blitz of Trump’s second term are unconstitutional.

On Friday, a federal judge overseeing the case temporarily Trump’s orders.

In a 63-page opinion issued Friday night, U.S. District Court Judge Adam Abelson wrote that “As Plaintiffs put it, ‘[e]fforts to foster inclusion have been widespread and uncontroversially legal for decades.’ … Plaintiffs’ irreparable harms include widespread chilling of unquestionably protected speech.”

The stay came just one week before school systems in Maryland and beyond were facing a deadline to determine whether they needed to alter key aspects of their operations in response to a recent memo from the U.S. Department of Education. It is uncertain how long the reprieve will remain in effect.

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