As GOP AGs Target Title VI, 40+ Groups Rally to Defend Civil Rights

Today, a coalition of over 45 groups, including environmental justice and civil rights organizations, along with community-based and grassroots groups, submitted a letter to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), calling on the agency to reject a petition filed by Republican attorneys general seeking to rescind critical Title VI protections. The attorneys general petition, referred to in the letter as the "Civil Rights Rollback," calls for eviscerating decades-old civil rights regulations and undermines protections necessary to safeguard Black, Latinx, Indigenous, and other marginalized communities from disproportionate environmental harms.

Title VI of the 1964 Civil Rights Act prohibits discrimination based on race, color, or national origin by federal funding recipients. These regulations are essential to safeguarding environmental justice communities from the cumulative and often devastating effects of industrial pollution, biased zoning, inequitable permitting of industrial facilities, and other practices that disproportionately impact communities of color.

“Title VI is key to defend communities in places like Louisiana’s Cancer Alley that have been enduring the pain of environmental injustice for far too long” said the coalition in a statement. “This petition from attorney generals to end Title VI, this coordinated attack on civil rights, will turn more communities into industrial sacrifice zones where families are left to suffer for profit. The EPA, the federal government, and states must strengthen, not weaken, its commitment to civil rights.”

The coalition’s letter highlights the Biden administration’s commitment to environmental justice, as outlined in Executive Order 14096, which mandates federal agencies to advance environmental justice for all by implementing and enforcing the nation’s environmental and civil rights laws. It calls for the agency to center the experiences of these communities in its decision-making processes and to fully resource its Title VI enforcement efforts.

The letter to EPA comes two weeks after a federal judge in Louisiana permanently blocked the EPA and Department of Justice from enforcing disparate impact regulations under Title VI in that state. Earlier that same day, EPA unveiled new Title VI guidance to ensure that state and local government entities receiving federal funding put safeguards in place that prevent discrimination in their programs and activities.

Quotes from coalition member groups and partners:

“In Louisiana, we have a governor who is openly hostile to civil rights protections and actively sabotaged efforts to protect Black communities from disproportionate environmental harm. Now, 23 state attorneys general are trying to follow his shameful lead,” said Robert Taylor, founder of Concerned Citizens of St. John. “The EPA needs to step up and defend our civil rights with the strength and commitment that the moment demands. This is about protecting the families and communities the agency was created to serve and ensure that our children have a future free from environmental injustice. The stakes couldn’t be higher—now is the time to take action and refuse to back down.”

“Environmental racism remains a pervasive and dangerous problem across the United States, including in Florida, with our state’s heavy reliance on trash-burning incinerators,” said MacKenzie Marcelin, climate justice director of Florida Rising. “Communities of color continue to bear the brunt of toxic pollution and climate change impacts. We need the EPA to stand firm against any attack on civil rights and Title VI.”

“In this critical moment of the climate crisis, we must protect our most vulnerable communities with every resource available and Title VI has been a powerful shield for every community seeking environmental justice,” said KeShaun Pearson, president of Memphis Community Against Pollution. “These attempts to weaken the Civil Rights Act, when we should be celebrating and codifying the impact it has made on this country in the last 60 years, are a show of cowardice and fear.”