Education Department staff cuts could limit options for families of kids
with disabilities
[March 17, 2025]
By ANNIE MA
WASHINGTON (AP) — For parents of kids with disabilities, advocating for
their child can be complicated, time-consuming — and expensive.
Changes at the Education Department are likely to make the process even
more difficult, advocates for kids with disabilities say.
When a parent believes their child is not receiving proper services or
school accommodations for a disability, they can seek remedies from
their district. They can file complaints with their state, arguing the
child's rights have been taken away without due process of law, or even
pursue litigation in state or federal courts.
Those processes often involve multiple sessions with hearing officers
who are not required to be experts in disability law. Legal fees can
cost tens of thousands of dollars for a single case. Legal aid and other
advocacy organizations that can provide free assistance often have more
demand for their services than they can meet.
But filing a complaint with the Education Department has long been an
option for families who can't afford a lawyer. They begin by filling out
the Office for Civil Rights' online form, documenting the alleged
instances of discrimination. From there, the agency's staff is supposed
to investigate the complaint, often interviewing school district
employees and examining district policies for broader possible
violations.
“It’s known and has the weight of the federal government behind it,”
said Dan Stewart, managing attorney for education and employment at the
National Disability Rights Network. “The process, the complaint portal,
as well as the processing manual are all in public, and it does not
require or typically involve lawyers.”
That option seems increasingly out of reach, advocates say.
Under President Donald Trump, the Education Department’s staff has been
cut approximately in half — including in the Office for Civil Rights,
whose attorneys are charged with investigating complaints of
discrimination against kids with disabilities. The staff has been
directed to prioritize antisemitism cases. More than 20,000 pending
cases — including those related to kids with disabilities, historically
the largest share of the office’s work — largely sat idle for weeks
after Trump took office. A freeze on processing the cases was lifted
early this month, but advocates question whether the department can make
progress on them with a smaller staff.
“The reduction in force is simply an evisceration of the Office for
Civil Rights’ investigatory authority and responsibility,” Stewart said.
“There’s no way that I can see that OCR can keep up with the backlog or
with the incoming complaints.”
A federal lawsuit filed Friday challenges the layoffs at the Office for
Civil Rights, saying they decimated the office's ability to process and
investigate complaints.
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Protestors gather during a demonstration at the headquarters of the
Department of Education, Friday, March 14, 2025, in Washington. (AP
Photo/Mark Schiefelbein)
While the OCR process was not perfect, reducing the office’s
investigative staff will only worsen the challenges families face
when seeking support for their kids, said Nikki Carter, an advocate
for kids with disabilities and one of the plaintiffs in the lawsuit.
“It makes them feel hopeless and helpless,” Carter said. “By
reducing the number of employees to handle cases, by putting
stipulations on certain cases, it only makes it feel intensified.”
Education Department officials insist the staff reductions will not
affect civil rights investigations and the layoffs were “strategic
decisions.”
In her state of Alabama, Carter said families face an uphill battle
to finding legal representation.
“They don’t have the money for an attorney,” she said. “Or the
representation they’re getting is not the representation they feel
like will be best for their child.”
Even if families can afford the high costs, a limited number of
attorneys have the expertise to take on disability discrimination
cases. Programs that offer free representation often have limited
capacity.
If the backlog of cases increases at the federal Office for Civil
Rights, families may lose faith in how quickly the department will
investigate their complaints, Stewart said. That may drive them to
alternate pathways, such as filing state complaints.
But state and local agencies haven't always had the capacity or
understanding to handle education disability complaints, Stewart
said, since those cases so often went to the U.S. Education
Department.
“They might not have the infrastructure or the knowledge or the
staffing to take on the influx of cases,” Stewart said.
In a separate federal lawsuit filed Thursday, Democratic attorneys
general argued the staff reductions at the Education Department may
embolden school districts to ignore complaints of discrimination or
harassment.
“Students with current complaints will likely see no meaningful
resolution, with cases backlogged due to the shortage of employees
to resolve them,” the lawsuit said. “Students facing discrimination,
sexual harassment or sexual assault will lose a critical avenue to
report their case.”
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