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The American Bar Association has suspended its diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) standard in response to the Trump administration’s Department of Education (DOE) mandate that such policies be eliminated or federal funding for higher education may be cut.
The suspension of this standard, called Standard 206, will last until at least Aug. 31, 2025, the ABA Legal Education and Admissions to the Bar Section council voted on Friday, Feb. 21, 2025. In the meantime, the council will draft a new standard to be presented to the ABA House of Delegates at the Annual Meeting in August.
“The committee’s view is that with the executive orders and the law being in flux, it would be an extreme hardship for law schools if our standards were to require them to do certain things that may cause them to take more litigation risks and potentially violate the law,” said Daniel Thies, chair-elect of the council and co-chair of its Strategic Review Committee.
Standard 205, titled “Non‐Discrimination and Equality of Opportunity,” has not been suspended but will be reexamined, said Carla D. Pratt, chair of the Strategic Review Committee. Additionally, Standard 303-C, which requires law schools to provide education related to cultural competence, racism and bias, was not suspended.1
The Department of Education’s ban on DEI policies stems from the U.S. Supreme Court’s June 2023 decision eliminating race-based admissions programs at higher-learning institutions. A Feb. 14 memo from Acting DOE Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights Craig Trainor2 cited the SCOTUS decision, as did the White House executive order.3
In November, the council proposed revisions to Standard 206 that included a list of 15 identity characteristics law schools should consider when hiring and admitting.
In response to these proposed revisions, a memo from a coalition of 21 attorneys general warned that the revised version violated the Supreme Court’s decision in Students for Fair Admissions v. President and Fellows of Harvard College and “impermissibly impose(d) race-based admissions and hiring requirements as a condition of accreditation.”
Those respondents said the revisions would force law schools to “choose between maintaining their accreditation and violating the law or following the law and putting their accreditation in jeopardy,” according to a Feb. 13 ABA council memo.4 “Having and enforcing revised Standard 206 may also harm the Council’s ability to continue as a recognized accreditor.”
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2 https://www.ed.gov/media/document/dear-colleague-letter-sffa-v-harvard-109506.pdf