WASHINGTON (AP) — Before President Donald Trump's administration started dismantling the Education Department, the agency served as a powerful enforcer in cases of sexual violence at schools and universities. It brought the weight of the government against schools that mishandled sexual assault complaints involving students.
That work is quickly fading away.
The department’s Office for Civil Rights was gutted in Trump’s mass layoffs last year, leaving half as many lawyers to investigate complaints of discrimination based on race, sex or disability in schools. Those who remain face a backlog of more than 25,000 cases.
Investigations have dwindled. Before the layoffs last March, the office opened dozens of sexual violence investigations a year. Since then, it's opened fewer than 10 nationwide, according to internal data obtained by The Associated Press.
Yet Trump's Republican administration has doubled down on sexual discrimination cases of another kind. Trump officials have used Title IX, a 1972 gender equality law, against schools that make accommodations for transgender students and athletes. The Office for Civil Rights has opened nearly 50 such investigations since Trump took office a year ago.
Even before the layoffs, critics said the office was understaffed and moved too slowly. Now, many firms that handle Title IX cases have stopped filing complaints, calling it a dead end.
“It almost feels like you’re up against the void,” said Katie McKay, a lawyer at the New York firm C.A. Goldberg.
“It feels like a big question mark right now,” she said. “How are we supposed to hold a school accountable once it has messed up?”
An Education Department spokesperson said the office is working through its caseload, blaming President Joe Biden's Democratic administration for leaving a backlog and rewriting Title IX rules to protect LGBTQ+ students. Trump officials rolled back those rules.
“The Trump Administration has restored commonsense safeguards against sexual violence by returning sex-based separation in intimate facilities,” spokesperson Julie Hartman said. “OCR is and will continue to safeguard the dignity and safety of our nation’s students.”
The layoffs have slowed work at the Office for Civil Rights across the board, but it has an outsize impact on cases of sexual violence. Students who are mistreated by their schools — including victims and accused students alike — have few other venues to pursue justice.
Many are now left with two options: File a lawsuit or walk away.
One woman said she’s losing hope for a complaint she filed in 2024. She alleges her graduate school failed to follow its own policies when it suspended but didn't expel another student found by the school to have sexually assaulted her. No one has contacted her about the complaint since 2024.
The woman recently sued her school as a last resort. She said it feels like a David and Goliath mismatch.
“They have all the power, because there is no large organization holding them accountable. It’s just me, just this one individual who’s filing this simple suit," the woman said. The AP does not typically identify people who say they are victims of sexual assault unless they grant permission.
The civil rights office is supposed to provide a free alternative to litigation. Anyone can file a complaint, which can trigger an investigation and sanctions for schools that violate federal law.
In 2024, the agency received more than 1,000 complaints involving sexual violence or sexual harassment, according to an annual report.
It’s unclear how many complaints have been filed more recently. Trump's administration has not reported newer figures. In conversations with the AP, some staffers said cases are piling up so quickly they can’t track how many involve sexual violence.
In December, the department acknowledged the civil rights backlog and announced dozens of downsized workers would be brought back to the office amid a legal challenge to their layoffs. The workers' return offers some hope to those with pending civil rights complaints. Department officials have vowed to keep pushing for the layoffs.
Before Trump was elected to his second term, the office had more than 300 pending investigations involving sexual assault, according to a public database. Most of those cases are believed to be sitting idle as investigators prioritize easier complaints, according to staffers who spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of retribution.
The details of past cases underscore the urgency of the work.
In 2024, the office took action against a Pennsylvania school system after a girl with a disability told staff she had been sexually touched by a bus driver. She was put back on that driver’s bus later that afternoon, plus the next two days. The district was required to designate a Title IX coordinator for its schools, review previous complaints and consider compensation for the girl's family.
That year, the office demanded changes at a Montana school where a boy was pinned down by other students and assaulted after a wrestling practice. The students had been suspended for three days after school officials treated it as a case of hazing instead of sexual assault.
In another case, the office sided with a University of Notre Dame student who had been expelled over accusations of sexual misconduct. The student said the college never told him precisely what he was accused of and refused to interview witnesses he put forward.
Cases that get attention from the federal office are being handled under federal rules created during Trump’s first term. Those rules were designed to bolster the rights of students accused of sexual misconduct.
Lawyers who work with accused students see little improvement.
Justin Dillon, a Washington lawyer, said some of his recent complaints have been opened for investigation. He tells clients not to hold their breath. Even before the layoffs, cases could drag on for years, he said.
Others gave up on the office years ago. The LLF National Law Firm said it stopped filing complaints in 2021 in favor of suing schools directly. Lawyers at the firm said the office had become incapable of delivering timely outcomes, which was only worsened by the layoffs.
Complaints can be resolved several ways. They can be dismissed if they don't pass legal muster. Many go to mediation, akin to a settlement. Some end in voluntary agreements from schools, with plans to rectify past wrongs and prevent future ones.
In 2024, under Biden, the office secured 23 voluntary agreements from schools and colleges in cases involving sexual violence, according to a public database. In 2018, during Trump’s first term, there were 58. Since Trump took office again last year, there have been none.
The dismantling of the Office for Civil Rights comes as a blow to Laura Dunn, a civil rights lawyer who was influential in getting President Barack Obama's Democratic administration to make campus sexual assault a priority. As the issue gained public attention, the office started fielding hundreds of complaints a year.
“All the progress survivors have made by sharing their story is being lost,” said Dunn, who's now a Democratic candidate for Congress in New York. “We are literally losing civil rights progress in the United States, and it’s pushing us back more than 50 years.”
The Associated Press’ education coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. The AP is solely responsible for all content. Find the AP's standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.
FILE - The U.S. Department of Education building is seen in Washington, on Nov. 18, 2024. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana, File)
President Donald Trump took the unusual step on Friday of thanking the Iranian government for not following through on executions of what he said was meant to be hundreds of political prisoners.
“Iran canceled the hanging of over 800 people,” Trump told reporters while leaving the White House to spend the weekend at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Florida, adding that he “greatly respected” the move.
The sentiment seemed to back away from Trump’s recent repeated suggestions that the U.S. might strike Iran militarily if its government triggered mass killings during widespread protests that swept that country but now have quieted.
Over the past two days, several Middle Eastern allies of the U.S. had urged the Trump administration to hold off on striking, fearing such action would destabilize an already volatile region as well as the global economy.
Here's the latest:
The Supreme Court agreed on Friday to hear an appeal from global agrochemical manufacturer Bayer to block thousands of state lawsuits alleging it failed to warn people that its popular weedkiller could cause cancer.
The justices will consider whether the Environmental Protection Agency’s approval of the Roundup weedkiller without a cancer warning should rule out the state court claims.
The Trump administration has weighed in on Bayer’s behalf, reversing the Biden administration’s position and putting it at odds with some supporters of the Make America Healthy Again agenda who oppose giving the company the legal immunity it seeks.
Some studies associate Roundup’s key ingredient, glyphosate, with cancer, although the EPA has said it is not likely to be carcinogenic to humans when used as directed.
The president posted a letter to Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi reading, “I am ready to restart U.S. mediation between Egypt and Ethiopia to responsibly resolve the question of ‘The Nile Water Sharing’ once and for all.”
Ethiopia inaugurated the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam last fall. Africa’s largest dam, it is located on the Blue Nile near Ethiopia’s border with Sudan.
Washington-led mediation efforts over the dam’s construction began during Trump’s first term, but they effectively collapsed in 2020, when Ethiopia withdrew.
Ethiopia sees the dam as an economic boon. But Egypt opposed its construction, arguing it would reduce the country’s share of Nile River waters.
Exiled Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi on Friday encouraged Iranians to take to the streets again this weekend, just as the nationwide protests had been smothered following the killing of more than at least 2,600 protesters by Iranian security forces.
In a post on X, the son of the deposed king urged his “brave compatriots” to “raise your voices of anger and protest” Saturday to Monday.
“The world sees your courage and will offer clearer and more practical support to your national revolution,” Pahlavi said in the post.
His comments came after Iran had returned to uneasy calm after a wave of protests that drew a bloody crackdown and warnings of massive executions to come for the thousands detained across the country.
Trump had also encouraged the protests to continue earlier in the week, saying “help was on the way.”
Days later, Trump backed off on his threats after saying he got assurances that the killings had stopped and executions would be halted.
Trump beamed with pride on Friday at an event held in a Mar-a-Lago ballroom in which a stretch of Southern Boulevard in Palm Beach County, Florida was named after him.
The portion of the road goes from Palm Beach International Airport to Trump’s residence, the Mar-a-Lago Club.
“I’m tremendously honored,” Trump said. “That’s a very important stretch. A lot of people, a lot of important people, and I don’t care if they’re important or not, but important and not important people travel on that road.”
The president said of the street sign: “When people see that the beautiful sign is all lit up nice at night and it says ‘Donald J. Trump Boulevard,’ they’ll be filled with pride. Just pride. Not in me. Pride in our country.”
National Guard troops will be on the streets of Washington, D.C., until the end of the year, according to a memo reviewed by The Associated Press.
The memo, signed by Army Secretary Dan Driscoll and dated Wednesday, said “the conditions of the mission” warranted an extension past the end of next month to continue supporting President Donald Trump’s “ongoing efforts to restore law and order.”
It comes after Trump said this month that for now he was dropping his push to deploy National Guard troops in Chicago, Los Angeles and Portland, Oregon, as he faced legal challenges.
In Washington, troops have been charged with patrolling the streets and picking up trash. Trump has asserted repeatedly that crime has vanished in the city.
The National Guard has about 2,400 troops in Washington, with about 700 from D.C. and the rest from 11 other states with Republican governors, including Indiana, South Carolina, Alabama and Oklahoma.
The vice president’s office confirmed he will be speaking at the Jan. 23 event in Washington.
The annual rally by abortion opponents on the National Mall draws thousands and typically features remarks from leading conservative politicians. Vance spoke at the event in person last year and Trump spoke in a pre-recorded video message.
Trump told reporters on Friday that he pre-recorded a message for the march.
Several Republicans surveyed in our latest AP-NORC poll explained their reasoning: It hinged less on tangible benefits to themselves and their families and more on a feeling that Trump had successfully averted Biden-era polices that they felt were leading the country astray.
For John Candela, a 64-year-old father and grandfather in New Rochelle, New York, that included securing the southern border and Trump’s about-face on more progressive social policies, such as Biden’s federal support for transgender Americans.
″All these things that, in my mind, was wrong,” he said. “Now, I got somebody in the presidency that was thinking along my lines as far as getting back to what it should be.”
The office of Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz says it’s “engaged in ongoing conversation with the White House.”
The Democratic governor’s office issued that statement Friday after President Donald Trump pulled back on his threat to invoke the Insurrection Act and deploy troops to quell protests in Minneapolis.“
The governor met with former governors and business, faith, elected, and civic leaders urging them to help lower the temperature and appeal to Trump administration leadership,” Walz’s office said.
On Thursday, Walz’s office said he was attempting to get hold of Trump over the threat. White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt questioned whether his request was genuine.
“Creators must stretch their minds to think differently,” the first lady said during a webinar sponsored by Zoom, adding that AI has opened a world of endless “possibility.”
But she warned students against relying too heavily on the growing technology.
“Choose to let your imagination drive your intellectual progress,” she said. “But never use AI as a quick solution. Be intellectually honest with yourself, use AI as a tool, but do not let it replace your personal intelligence.”
The first lady is active in White House efforts on AI and education. She also used AI technology to produce the audiobook of her memoir, “Melania.”
Trump has pulled back on his threat to invoke the Insurrection Act and deploy troops to quell protests in Minneapolis, saying Friday there wasn’t a reason for him to use it “right now.”
“If I needed it, I’d use it,” the president told reporters Friday. “I don’t think there’s any reason right now to use it, but if I needed it, I’d use it. It’s very powerful.”
Trump threatened Thursday to invoke the 1807 law as protests in the city continued against federal officers enforcing his massive immigration crackdown.
A man was shot and wounded Wednesday by an immigration officer who’d been attacked with a shovel and broom handle. That shooting further heightened fear and anger since a federal agent fatally shot Renee Good last week.
Asked about Canada breaking with the U.S. and reaching a pact to cut its 100% tariff on Chinese electric cars, Trump said, “Well, it’s OK.”
“That’s what he should be doing and it’s a good thing for him to sign a trade deal,” Trump said of Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney.
“If you can get a deal with China, you should do that,” Trump added.
Carney announced the deal Friday. In exchange, Canada will get lower Chinese tariffs on its farm products.
The agreement followed Carney being unable to reach a deal with Trump to reduce some U.S. tariffs that are punishing key sectors of the Canadian economy.
“I thought it was very nice,” Trump told reporters as he left the White House to travel to Florida.
The president claims to have ended eight wars and said Maria Corina Machado, Venezuela’s opposition leader, told him that no one deserved the prize more than him.
“I thought it was a very nice gesture,” Trump said. “And by the way, I think she’s a very fine woman and we’ll be talking again.”
Trump and Machado met at the White House on Thursday. The organization that oversees the Nobel Peace Prize recently said the prize cannot be revoked, transferred or shared with others once it has been announced.
Italy’s Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani said Friday he had a “long and cordial” phone conversation with U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, during which he confirmed his presence in Washington at the February meeting on critical minerals.
“I expressed my appreciation for the United States’ support for the release of Alberto Trentini and other Italian political prisoners, and for the release of other Italians still in Venezuelan prisons,” Tajani wrote on X.
“On Greenland, I reiterated the importance of ensuring the security of the Arctic region within the NATO framework,” he added.
“We want to engage with the U.S. and work together on the crisis in Iran and for peace in Ukraine.”
On Gaza, Tajani renewed Rome’s commitment to implementing the second phase of the U.S. plan “in terms of humanitarian aid, security, governance, and reconstruction.”
Nobel Peace Prize winners can give away their medals but the original laureate remains the prize’s recipient, the Norwegian Nobel Committee said Friday, a day after Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado said she presented her medal to President Donald Trump.
The committee said in a statement that a laureate cannot share the prize or transfer it to others once it’s been announced. But the medal, prize money of diploma can be given away, donated and sold, with several having done so over the decades.
The committee added that it does not “see it as their role to engage in day-to-day commentary on Peace Prize laureates or the political processes that they are engaged in.”
President Donald Trump took the unusual step on Friday of thanking the Iranian government for not following through on executions of what he said was meant to be hundreds of political prisoners.
“Iran canceled the hanging of over 800 people,” Trump told reporters while leaving the White House to spend the weekend at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Florida. He added “and I greatly respect the fact that they canceled.”
The Republican president also suggested on his social media site that more than 800 people had been set to be executed, but he said they now won’t be. Those sentiments come after Trump spent days suggesting that the U.S. might strike Iran militarily if its government triggered mass killings during widespread protests that have swept that country.
The death toll from those protests continues to rise, activists say. Still, Trump seemed to hint that the prospects for U.S. military action were fading since Iran had held off on the executions.
▶ Read more about Iran protests
A White House official says President Donald Trump plans to pardon former Puerto Rico Gov. Wanda Vázquez.
Vázquez pleaded guilty last August to a campaign finance violation in a federal case that authorities say also involved a former FBI agent and a Venezuelan banker. Her sentencing was set for later this month.
Federal prosecutors had been seeking one year behind bars. The official who confirmed the planned pardon wasn’t authorized to reveal the news by name and on the condition of anonymity Friday. Vázquez was the U.S. territory’s first former governor to plead guilty to a crime, specifically accepting a donation from a foreigner for her 2020 political campaign.
▶ Read more about pardon of ex-Puerto Rico Gov. Wanda Vázquez
— Darlene Superville
“It’s a pleasure to interact with journalists who can speak freely,” Machado said in Spanish, just before she exited the stage at Heritage Foundation.
Machado gives few glimpses into what she feels US should do
In several different lines of questioning about what she felt Trump should do or if she had urged the U.S. president to make certain moves, Machado repeatedly deferred, saying, “I think I don’t need to urge the president on specific things.”
She also said she was “very impressed” at how closely she perceived Trump was following the situation in Venezuela.
Machado won’t speculate if Rodríguez should take part in new elections
“I’m not going to speculate,” Machado said in Spanish, in response to a question about if Venezuela’s acting president should participate. “I’m just speaking about the facts. About Mrs. Delcy Rodríguez, I believe U.S. justice has enough information.”
“It’s very clear what her profile is,” she added.
Asked if she feared Trump’s statements that he’s working with Rodriguez would perpetuate the current regime, Machado responded that she felt Rodríguez was “just following orders.”
Describing the ongoing transition in vague terms, Machado offered no deadlines for elections that could disrupt the Trump administration’s plans to stabilize the country.
But the opposition leader expressed confidence that at the end of that process, democracy would be restored and Venezuela’s economy would emerge as the “real Latin American miracle.”
Trump has said it would be difficult for Machado to lead because she “doesn’t have the support within or the respect within the country” and, while he’s signaled support for new elections, has given no timeline.
Machado’s party is widely believed to have won 2024 elections rejected by Maduro
Machado said she wouldn’t speak too much about how she was able to safely leave her home country late last year, but she did say she was hurt while on a boat and that “we got lost in the ocean.”
“For protection of those involved and helped me get here, I will wait until the regime is no longer in capacity to harm them to share that detail,” Machado said.
Before she appeared in Oslo, Norway, in December, hours after her daughter accepted her Nobel Peace Prize, Machado had been in hiding for nearly a year, when she was briefly detained after joining supporters in a protest in Caracas, Venezuela’s capital. An American firm with experience in special operations helped spirit her out of Venezuela en route to Norway.
President Donald Trump speaks during an event to honor the 2025 Stanley Cup Champion Florida Panthers in the East Room of the White House, Thursday, Jan. 15, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
