Trump Administration Scraps Federal Ban on Segregated Facilities, Dismantling Civil Rights Protections

A Seismic Shift in Federal Policy

A quiet but seismic shift in federal policy has removed explicit bans on segregated facilities from government contracts. NPR’s Selena Simmons-Duffin reports in her March 18, 2025, article, ‘Segregated Facilities’ Are No Longer Explicitly Banned in Federal Contracts, that the General Services Administration (GSA) has erased long-standing anti-segregation clauses from federal procurement regulations—without public notice or comment.

This move, stemming from a Trump executive order, weakens a key enforcement mechanism for civil rights protections, leaving federal contractors free to operate facilities with segregated restaurants, waiting areas, and drinking fountains.

The Removal of a Civil Rights Pillar

Clause 52.222-21 of the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR), which explicitly prohibited segregated facilities on the basis of race, gender, religion, or national origin, had been a cornerstone of civil rights enforcement since the 1960s.

The provision was a direct legacy of President Lyndon B. Johnson’s Executive Order 11246, which sought to enforce integration among businesses benefiting from federal dollars. Now, with the clause deleted, agencies such as the Departments of Defense, Commerce, and Homeland Security have already begun instructing contracting officers to disregard it.

Even the National Institutes of Health has confirmed that it will no longer enforce these requirements when awarding contracts.

A Loophole for Segregation and Legal Uncertainty

While civil rights laws such as the Civil Rights Act of 1964 technically remain in place, the removal of this provision eliminates an enforcement mechanism that ensured compliance within federal contracting. Legal experts warn that this erasure is both symbolic and substantive.

NYU constitutional law professor Melissa Murray calls it a significant rollback: “The fact that they are now excluding those provisions from the requirements for federal contractors, I think, speaks volumes.”

Without an explicit ban written into federal contracts, contractors have greater leeway to operate segregated facilities, with reduced risk of government scrutiny or legal repercussions.

Civil rights groups, including the NAACP and ACLU, are already weighing potential legal challenges, but experts warn that with a judiciary increasingly stacked with Trump-appointed judges, the outcome is far from certain.

A Sudden, Unchecked Implementation

The manner in which this policy change was implemented is just as troubling as its substance. Regulatory changes of this magnitude typically undergo a 45-to-90-day public notice period, allowing for legal challenges and procedural debate.

Instead, the administration forced the change through immediately—bypassing democratic processes and catching even federal employees off guard.

An anonymous federal contracting officer told NPR they were “shocked” by the abrupt implementation, adding that this tactic is typically reserved for national emergencies. The lack of transparency follows a now-familiar pattern under Trump’s second term: push through radical, regressive policies with as little public scrutiny as possible.

Part of a Larger Effort to Undermine Civil Rights

The implications of this decision stretch far beyond government contracting.

This rollback fits into a broader Trump agenda aimed at dismantling civil rights protections under the guise of “efficiency” and “deregulation.”

The administration has aggressively targeted diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs, removing DEI-related imagery from Pentagon archives, purging racial justice initiatives from government agencies, and systematically undoing Obama-era policies that expanded protections for marginalized groups.

This is the modern Republican Party’s strategy: not necessarily repealing civil rights laws outright but stripping them of their power through quiet administrative changes that shift the legal landscape beneath our feet.

Echoes of Authoritarianism and Global Parallels

Globally, this echoes authoritarian playbooks used by leaders like Viktor Orbán in Hungary and Vladimir Putin in Russia, where civil rights erosion is achieved incrementally—by chipping away at enforcement mechanisms rather than openly reinstating discriminatory policies.

In America, Trump’s approach relies on regulatory dismantling rather than overt segregationist rhetoric. The results, however, are functionally similar: businesses and institutions are given greater freedom to discriminate without consequence.

Lessons from History: The Dismantling of Rights

To understand the stakes, look at history. The dismantling of Reconstruction-era protections in the late 19th century paved the way for the Jim Crow era, where “separate but equal” policies ensured that Black Americans remained second-class citizens for nearly a century.

The Supreme Court’s Shelby County v. Holder decision in 2013 gutted the Voting Rights Act, leading to a wave of voter suppression laws.

Now, the same strategy is being used against anti-discrimination laws. The consequences are predictable: employers who once feared legal action for segregation may feel emboldened to quietly reintroduce discriminatory policies under the guise of “business preferences” or “customer demand.”

An Urgent Call to Action

This is not merely a rollback of one clause in a bureaucratic document—it is a deliberate step backward, an attempt to unravel the hard-won gains of the Civil Rights Movement.

The battle against segregation was never just about legislation; it was about ensuring mechanisms existed to enforce equality. Trump’s removal of the segregation clause weakens those mechanisms, opening the door for systemic discrimination to reemerge under the banner of “states’ rights” and “corporate freedom.”

🚨 The question now is clear: Will the courts, Congress, or the American public act before segregation returns under a different name?