What you need to know: This week, the federal government took a hard look at diversity programs and said, “What if… less of that?” while also voting against a global resolution calling the slave trade one of history’s greatest crimes. Meanwhile, millions of Americans hit the streets in nationwide protests, and the Supreme Court is gearing up to decide whether birthright citizenship still matters.
U.S. Votes Against UN Resolution Declaring Slave Trade ‘Gravest Crime’
The United States voted against a Ghana-led United Nations resolution that declared the transatlantic slave trade the “gravest crime against humanity” and urged nations to pursue reparations for people of African descent. The nonbinding measure, backed by more than 120 nations, calls for formal apologies, compensation, and other forms of reparatory justice for people of African descent worldwide, explicitly linking centuries of slavery to today’s anti-Black racism and economic inequality.
The Bigger Picture: For decades, organizers have pushed for a federal reparations commission and backed city-level efforts in Illinois, Michigan, New York, and California, but as racial justice commitments made in 2020 have waned, so has support for reparations policies. Washington’s opposition puts the U.S. at odds with much of the Global South and with Black reparations advocates at home, who view the vote as a rare opening for global accountability on slavery’s enduring harms.
Supreme Court Takes Up Landmark Birthright Citizenship Case
The U.S. Supreme Court prepares to hear one of the most consequential cases of the century this week, as justices consider whether President Donald Trump’s executive order ending birthright citizenship is constitutional. SCOTUS will hear oral arguments on April 1 in Trump v. Barbara, a challenge to Trump’s order that would bar automatic citizenship for babies born in the United States if their parents are in the country illegally or on a temporary visa.
Deep Dive: The case centers on the 14th Amendment’s citizenship clause, which states that “all persons born” in the United States who are “subject to the jurisdiction thereof” are citizens. If the Supreme Court endorses the administration’s view, the practical consequences would be enormous, affecting the legal status of as many as 250,000 babies born in the United States each year.
‘No Kings’ Protests Draw Millions Across All 50 States
More than eight million people turned out at over 3,300 No Kings protests across all 50 states Saturday, organizers said. Protesters rallied against Trump’s immigration enforcement, the ongoing war in Iran, and what they described as authoritarian overreach by his administration.
Minnesota served as the national flagship event, chosen in recognition of the state where federal agents fatally shot two people monitoring Trump’s immigration crackdown. White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson dismissed the protests as the product of “leftist funding networks” with little public support.
Trump Signs Executive Order Targeting DEI For Federal Contractors
President Trump signed an executive order targeting diversity, equity and inclusion programs at companies that hold federal contracts. The order calls on executive departments and agencies to ensure that federal contractors and subcontractors are not engaging in what it terms “racially discriminatory DEI activities,” and requires contractors to submit their books, records and accounts to confirm compliance.
The order requires that all federal contracts subject to the Federal Property and Administrative Services Act include a clause prohibiting contractors and their subcontractors from engaging in racially discriminatory DEI activities. Trump wrote that the new order is necessary because “some entities continue to engage in DEI activities and often attempt to conceal their efforts.”
The Impact: The order has the potential to harm further Black-owned businesses, which critics say have already been disproportionately affected by the Trump administration’s broader economic policies. Legal experts also raised questions about the order’s broad definitions, including whether a contractor’s participation in a career fair at a historically Black college or university could be deemed a racially discriminatory deployment of resources.
Underground Railroad Museum Sues Trump Administration Over Canceled Federal Grant
The Underground Railroad Education Center in Albany, New York, filed a lawsuit Friday alleging that the Trump administration unlawfully terminated its federal grant on the basis of race, pointing to President Donald Trump’s efforts to dismantle diversity-focused initiatives. The center alleges that the National Endowment for the Humanities’ cancellation of a $250,000 grant amounted to viewpoint and racial discrimination, violating the First and Fifth Amendments. The lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of New York, calls for the funds to be reinstated.
The Bigger Picture: The UREC is not the only Black historical institution to face funding setbacks. From local centers to the National Museum of African American History and Culture, many storied institutions have had to navigate the recall of exhibits and artifacts that do not align with the president’s anti-DEI directive. Nina Loewenstein, a lawyer for the museum, told NBC News there is “just no legitimate basis” for the grant’s cancellation, calling it “just explicitly erasing things associated with the Black race.”