President Trump removed two Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) leaders on Jan. 27, a move that one of the dismissed commissioners believes will influence who the organization chooses to protect from workplace discrimination moving forward.
The latest. Joceyln Samuels and Charlotte Burrows have been ousted as EEOC commissioners, in one of the White House’s latest efforts to rid federal agencies of DE&I. Both worked for the EEOC during the first Trump administration, NPR reported. Due to their dismissals, the commission, which needs at least three commissioners to operate, cannot currently create new policies or adequately work with employers to ensure they’re compliant with the law.
Samuels has worked in civil rights for decades and, after being nominated by Trump in 2020, had a bipartisan confirmation. She was supposed to serve in her role as one of the EEOC’s five commissioners until July 2026, until her term was cut short, potentially unlawfully.
“There had been all kinds of rumors swirling about what this administration might do to undermine the traditional role of independent agencies and their bipartisan nature,” Samuels told HR Brew, noting that she was aware of a “theoretical possibility” the administration could remove her from her post. The White House apparently told Samuels that her removal was because of her positions on diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility, and sex discrimination.
“Removing me, along with Commissioner Samuels, well before the expiration of our terms is unprecedented and will undermine the efforts of this independent agency to do the important work of protecting employees from discrimination, supporting employers’ compliance efforts and expanding public awareness and understanding of federal employment laws,” Burrows said in a statement on Tuesday.
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The following day, the acting EEOC chair, Andrea Lucas, announced major changes to policies involving nonbinary and transgender workers to comply with a recent executive order. Lucas said that biological and binary sex will be defended, and employees will no longer be able to identify their pronouns as nonbinary. She reiterated her stance that deadnaming an individual should not be considered harassment.
How the EEOC could change. “There has been a change in the nature of understanding of the law and appropriate policy,” Samuels said, noting that the changes happening at the EEOC could negatively impact employers and vulnerable workers as the agency moves more to the right.
“The idea that harassment of transgender individuals, mistreatment of them in the workplace, is now not only unlawful but condoned as potentially acceptable is just a shocking development,” she said. “The idea that those kinds of initiatives [DE&I] which disadvantage no one in the workplace are now considered radical and unacceptable DE&I ideology is just deeply disappointing.”
Samuels believes the changes could also impact the cases the EEOC pursues. “I worry that what we will see is the EEOC weighing in on behalf of people who have been denied jobs, who assert that it’s because of unlawful DE&I programs,” she said, noting that the previous EEOC quorum said that there was no evidence that DE&I initiatives have led to unlawful hiring practices. “I do think that there will be both policy and litigation efforts to enshrine this administration's interpretations of the law, and I think that’s going to cause harm to a lot of vulnerable people.”