NEWS: Sanders, 34 Senators Demand McMahon Reverse Failed Policies, Protect Students from Discrimination and Harassment

NEWS: Sanders, 34 Senators Demand McMahon Reverse Failed Policies, Protect Students from Discrimination and Harassment

WASHINGTON, May 27 — After the Trump administration tried to fire more than half of the investigators tasked with protecting the civil rights of students and left students nationwide without protection from alleged civil rights violations, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Ranking Member of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP), Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.), Vice Chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.), Ranking Member of the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies, Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Ct.), Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), Ranking Member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, and 30 senators called on Education Secretary Linda McMahon to take immediate actions to reverse its failed policies and finally protect students from discrimination, mistreatment and harassment. In their letter, the senators call on the Trump administration to provide a full accounting of the nearly 12,000 pending cases before the Office for Civil Rights (OCR) left without protection under the administration’s watch and to inform students nationwide about the status of their complaints.

“Make no mistake: OCR’s disastrous recent track record in providing enforceable relief for students is a direct consequence of choices made by the Trump administration,” Sanders and the senators wrote.

Since taking office, the administration has undertaken unprecedented efforts to gut OCR, the agency responsible for protecting students from discrimination based on race, sex, disability, color, national origin and age. In March 2025, the administration attempted to lay off nearly half of OCR’s workforce — costing taxpayers up to $38 million while investigators were barred from doing their jobs. The administration proposed a second round of layoffs during the 2025 shutdown before reversing course and reinstating staff.

“The Department formally rescinded those layoffs in January 2026, but only after nine months of paid inaction, sustained court orders, and congressional pressure,” the senators continued. “The students and families with pending cases cannot get that time back. Thousands of students who reached out to OCR for protection were denied any enforceable relief and that is unacceptable.”

Last month, Sanders released a new report finding that Trump’s Education Department has been the least productive in over a decade — reaching in 2025 the lowest number of resolution agreements in 12 years and, shockingly, reaching zero resolution agreements for students facing serious traumatic incidents including sexual harassment, sexual violence, seclusion, restraint, racial harassment and discriminatory school discipline. Despite receiving the same funding as the prior year, the report found OCR provided relief through resolution agreements in just 1% of pending cases in 2025.

The senators note that OCR has left 72.5% of complaints pending for over 180 days, and that the Government Accountability Office previously found 90% of complaints resolved between March and September 2025 were dismissed without substantive investigation. The senators demand that McMahon take the following specific and immediate actions to fulfill OCR’s legal obligations:

  • Reopen closed OCR regional offices
  • Hire more OCR investigators
  • Reach out to all students with pending cases and provide a status update on their case
  • Begin reaching resolution agreements in every category OCR reached zero
  • Cease the mass dismissal of complaints without proper review
  • Cease efforts to rescind existing resolution agreements
  • Restore OCR’s public transparency, including by regularly updating public data and providing detailed accounting on the status of cases, staffing levels and caseloads

Joining Sanders, Murray, Baldwin, Murphy and Durbin as cosigners on the letter are Sens. Angela Alsobrooks (D-Md.), Michael Bennet (D-Colo.), Lisa Blunt Rochester (D-Del.), Cory Booker (D-N.J.), Chris Coons (D-Del.), Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.), Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.), Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.), John Hickenlooper (D-Colo.), Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii), Tim Kaine (D-Va.), Andy Kim (D-N.J.), Angus King (I-Maine), Ben Ray Luján (D-N.M.), Ed Markey (D-Mass.), Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), Alex Padilla (D-Calif.), Jack Reed (D-R.I.), Jacky Rosen (D-Nev.), Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii), Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), Elissa Slotkin (D-Mich.), Tina Smith (D-Minn.), Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), Mark Warner (D-Va.), Raphael Warnock (D-Ga.), Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Ron Wyden (D-Ore.).

Read the letter here.