Trump Appointees Roll Back Enforcement of Fair Housing Laws

Say it aint so said:

In one email, a Trump appointee at the Department of Housing and Urban Development described decades of housing discrimination cases as “artificial, arbitrary and unnecessary.” In another, a career supervisor in the department’s Office of Fair Housing and Equal Opportunity objected to lawyers being reassigned to other offices; the supervisor was fired six days later for insubordination. In a third, the office’s director of enforcement warned that Trump appointees were using gag orders and intimidation to block discrimination cases from moving forward. The urgent message was sent to a U.S. senator, who is referring it to the department’s acting inspector general for investigation.​

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The emails are among dozens of pages of internal communications, memos and other documents reviewed by The New York Times that show efforts by the Trump administration to limit enforcement of the Fair Housing Act, the landmark civil rights law that has prohibited discrimination in housing for nearly six decades.​

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In interviews, half a dozen current and former employees of HUD’s fair housing office said that the Trump political appointees had made it nearly impossible for them to do their jobs, which involve investigating and prosecuting landlords, real estate agents, lenders and others who discriminate based on race, religion, gender, family status or disability. --NYT. ​

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More retribution?
Trump got sued early on for racial housing discrimination when the org was marking black applicants with a "C" for "colored" then throwing them in the trash can.

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Say it aint so said:

Trump Scrapping Cash Refunds For Flight Disruptions Bows To Airline Lobby​

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The Trump administration’s move to scrap a Biden-era proposal to give customers cash refunds when flights are significantly disrupted follows relentless and often partisan lobbying from the airline industry, and marks a boon to their efforts.​

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Airlines for America—which represents the carriers Alaska, American, Atlas Air, Delta, Hawaiian, JetBlue, Southwest and United—confirmed to Forbes that it had spent roughly $5.7 million on campaign donations in 2024. The largest amounts went to Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) and Roger Wicker (R-Miss.), both members of the U.S. Senate Committee for Commerce & Transportation. On April 2, the DOT quietly opened a docket seeking comments through May 5 on "Ensuring Lawful Governance and Implementation of the President's 'Department of Government Efficiency' Deregulatory Agenda." In response, the airline lobby filed a 93-page comment remarkable in its partisan tone and signed by the CEOs of seven major U.S. airlines. The document referred to “Biden/Buttigieg” 38 times—often modified with adjectives such as “unlawful” or “deceitful”—while beseeching Duffy “to implement the President’s deregulatory agenda.” In a statement to Forbes, Airlines for America echoed this tone. “We are encouraged by this Department of Transportation reviewing unnecessary and burdensome regulations that exceed its authority and don’t solve issues important to our customers,” the group said. “We look forward to working with DOT on implementing President Trump’s deregulatory agenda.” ---Forbes​

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