Bondi's DOJ dismisses numerous DEI cases against police, fire departments nationwide

WASHINGTON, DC - The Trump administration’s war against Biden-era DEI programs took another turn last week when the Department of Justice dismissed DEI lawsuits brought against various public safety agencies nationwide by the Biden Department of Justice (DOJ), which called aptitude tests in some instances “discriminatory.” 

In announcing the dismissals, Attorney General Pam Bondi said skill and dedication, not DEI quotas, should play a primary role in selecting firefighters and police officers, Fox News Digital reported. 

“American communities deserve firefighters and police officers to be chosen for their skill and dedication to public safety–not to meet DEI quotas,” Bondi said. 

The so-called consent decrees were implemented to address alleged improprieties in the hiring of minority applicants. 

However, the DOJ acknowledged that departments targeted used neutral selection tools, including credit checks, exams, and physical exercises to choose candidates for open positions, whereby white men tended to score or perform better. 

In one case filed in October against Durham, North Carolina, it was alleged taht “unintentional” discrimination against black applicants occurred because they couldn’t achieve a score of 70% or better on written examinations as often as white candidates did, thereby resulting in fewer black employees being hired. 

The consent decree proposed eliminating the written test and giving “back pay and/or preferential hiring to black candidates who were not hired because of the written exam” as solutions to the “problem.” According to the case, that would have cost the city of Durahm nearly $1 million in monetary relief. 

In another case filed against the Maryland State Police in 2024, the agency was recommended not to use current selection tools, including a written test requiring a passing score of 70% or better and a physical agility test including push-ups, sit-ups, a flexibility reach, a trigger pull, and a 1.5-mile run, all standard tests in law enforcement agility exams. 

“Because black applicants passed the test less often than white applicants and because women passed the physical test less often than men, the Civil Rights Division concluded that Maryland was illegally discriminating against black applicants and women,” the case said. 

To resolve the case, the DOJ recommended eliminating the previous selection tools and providing $2.75 million in monetary relief to black applicants who were not hired because of their written test results and women who were not hired because of their physical test results. 

The DOJ said similar cases were brought against Cobb County, Georgia, and South Bend, Indiana. 

The DOJ said the dismissed cases were “an early step toward eradicating illegal DEI preferences across the government and in the private sector.”