American Bar Association Ends D.E.I. Standards Under Trump Pressure

The American Bar Association, the lawyers group that sets standards for the legal profession, eliminated on Tuesday a diversity requirement for law schools after facing pressure from the Trump administration.

The bar association said that the diversity requirement could jeopardize its role as an accreditor that oversees nearly 200 juris doctorate programs.

The association’s mandate had said that law schools should demonstrate by “concrete action” a commitment to diversity and inclusion, including having a diverse faculty and student body. The bar association did not tell schools how to meet the requirement but said that to be accredited, schools would be judged “on the totality of the law school’s actions and the results achieved.” It was originally adopted in 1980 and had been in its current form since 2014.

But the group suspended the standard in February 2025, shortly after the Trump administration began an aggressive effort to stamp out diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives at colleges and in American life.

On Tuesday, the association’s accreditation council struck down the standard on a 10-6 vote, effective immediately.

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An A.B.A. committee in May said that it was recommending eliminating the diversity requirement because the Education Department would view it as a violation of federal law. The committee also said it had received feedback from state supreme courts that the mandate was “a non-neutral standard that is outside the accreditor’s role.”

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