Federal efforts to hold schools and universities accountable for sexual violence have dramatically collapsed under the Trump administration, with the number of new investigations plummeting by more than 90% following deep cuts to the US Education Department.
A Crippled Enforcement Agency
The department's Office for Civil Rights (OCR), once a powerful enforcer in cases of sexual assault and harassment on campus, has been severely weakened. Mass layoffs ordered by President Donald Trump last year gutted the office, leaving half as many lawyers to handle discrimination complaints. The remaining staff now face a staggering backlog exceeding 25,000 cases.
Internal data obtained by The Associated Press reveals the stark decline in activity. Before the layoffs in March 2025, the office routinely opened dozens of sexual violence investigations annually. Since then, it has initiated fewer than 10 new investigations nationwide.
"It almost feels like you’re up against the void," said Katie McKay, a New York lawyer representing victims. "How are we supposed to hold a school accountable once it has messed up?"
Shift in Focus and a Growing Backlog
While probes into sexual violence have dwindled, the Trump administration has aggressively pursued a different type of discrimination case. Officials have used Title IX, the 1972 gender equality law, to target schools that provide accommodations for transgender students and athletes. Since Trump took office a year ago, the OCR has opened nearly 50 such investigations.
The layoffs have slowed all civil rights work, but the impact is particularly acute for sexual assault cases. Students mistreated by their institutions now have few avenues for justice outside of costly lawsuits. One woman, who filed a complaint in 2024 alleging her graduate school failed to properly handle her assault case, said she has heard nothing since. She has now resorted to suing the school herself.
An Education Department spokesperson, Julie Hartman, blamed the previous Biden administration for the backlog and defended Trump's policies. "The Trump Administration has restored commonsense safeguards against sexual violence," Hartman said, adding that the OCR "will continue to safeguard the dignity and safety of our nation’s students."
A Legacy of Accountability Unravels
The dismantling marks a stark reversal from previous administrations. Under President Barack Obama, campus sexual assault was made a priority, leading to hundreds of complaints being fielded each year. In 2024, under President Joe Biden, the office secured 23 voluntary agreements from schools to rectify failures in sexual violence cases. During Trump's first term in 2018, there were 58 such agreements. Since he returned to office last year, there have been none.
Past cases highlight the office's critical role. In 2024, it acted against a Pennsylvania school district that put a disabled girl back on a bus with a driver she accused of assault. It also intervened in a Montana school that treated a violent sexual assault as mere hazing, and sided with a University of Notre Dame student expelled in a procedurally flawed misconduct case.
Laura Dunn, a civil rights lawyer instrumental in Obama-era reforms and now a Democratic congressional candidate, sees a devastating regression. "All the progress survivors have made by sharing their story is being lost," Dunn said. "We are literally losing civil rights progress in the United States, and it’s pushing us back more than 50 years."
With the enforcement mechanism effectively disabled, many law firms have stopped filing complaints with the OCR altogether, viewing it as a dead end. For victims of sexual violence seeking accountability, the path to justice has become significantly harder to find.
