In November 2021, the Biden administration opened an investigation into whether the Lowndes County Health Department and the Alabama Department of Public Health were violating Title VI of the Civil Rights Act by discriminating against Black residents in the provision of sanitation access. Around a year and a half later, the Justice Department secured a landmark settlement that put Lowndes County on a path to provide Black residents with basic sanitation services that more affluent white communities have long received. “Today starts a new chapter for Black residents of Lowndes County, Alabama, who have endured health dangers, indignities and racial injustice for far too long,” said Kristen Clarke, who was, at that time, Assistant Attorney General of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division.

Earlier this month, the Department of Justice announced that, pursuant to President Donald Trump’s executive order “ending radical and wasteful government DEI programs and preferencing,” it was terminating the settlement immediately. “The DOJ will no longer push ‘environmental justice’ as viewed through a distorting, DEI lens,” said Harmeet K. Dhillon, Clarke’s successor in the Civil Rights Division. “Americans deserve a government committed to serving every individual with dignity and respect, and to expending taxpayer resources in accordance with the national interest, not arbitrary criteria.”