{"id":9554,"date":"2026-01-15T08:45:39","date_gmt":"2026-01-15T08:45:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/federal-district-court-enjoins-dol-implementation-of-federal-contractor-dei-certification-requirement\/"},"modified":"2026-01-15T17:37:48","modified_gmt":"2026-01-15T17:37:48","slug":"federal-district-court-enjoins-dol-implementation-of-federal-contractor-dei-certification-requirement","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/federal-district-court-enjoins-dol-implementation-of-federal-contractor-dei-certification-requirement\/","title":{"rendered":"Federal District Court Enjoins DOL Implementation of Federal Contractor DEI Certification Requirement"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"contentSummaryCollapse\" style=\"--intro-p-height: 10.3125rem;\">\n<div class=\"inner-collapse\">\n<p>On April 15, 2025, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois issued a preliminary injunction enjoining the U.S. Department of Labor (\u201cDOL\u201d) from implementing certain provisions of President Trump\u2019s January 20 and January 21 Executive Orders related to diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility (\u201cDEI\u201d or \u201cDEIA\u201d) on First Amendment and separation of powers grounds. Specifically, the court blocked the DOL from enforcing requirements that federal contractors certify that their compliance with federal anti-discrimination laws is material for purposes of the False Claims Act, and that they do not operate \u201cany programs promoting DEI.\u201d The court also halted the termination of an \u201cequity-related\u201d grant related to the Women in Apprenticeship and Nontraditional Occupations (\u201cWANTO\u201d) Act.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\">*\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0*\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0*<\/p>\n<p>In <em>Chicago Women in Trades<\/em> v. <em>Trump<\/em>, a non-profit organization, Chicago Women in Trades (\u201cCWIT\u201d), challenged several provisions of President Trump\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.whitehouse.gov\/presidential-actions\/2025\/01\/ending-radical-and-wasteful-government-dei-programs-and-preferencing\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">January 20<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.whitehouse.gov\/presidential-actions\/2025\/01\/ending-illegal-discrimination-and-restoring-merit-based-opportunity\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">January 21<\/a> DEI-Related Executive Orders, which we previously discussed here. The challenged provisions include:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>The \u201cCertification Provision,\u201d which requires all federal grants and contracts to include terms requiring that the contractor or grantee (i) \u201cagree that its compliance in all respects with all applicable Federal anti-discrimination laws is material to the government\u2019s payment decisions for purposes of [the False Claims Act]\u201d; and (ii) \u201ccertify that it does not operate any programs promoting DEI that violate any applicable Federal anti-discrimination laws.\u201d<\/li>\n<li>The \u201cTermination Provision,\u201d which requires all federal agencies to \u201cterminate . . . \u2018equity-related\u2019 grants or contracts.\u201d<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>The court held that CWIT would likely be able to prove that the Certification Provision violates the First Amendment because it \u201cattempts to regulate grantees\u2019 speech outside of their federally-funded programs.\u201d The court wrote that \u201c[t]he provision on its face makes clear that a counterparty must certify that it does not operate <em>any<\/em> program that promotes DEI, irrespective of whether the program is federally funded.\u201d The court further found that the vagueness of the Certification Provision requires grantees to make an \u201cimpossible\u201d choice: \u201cdecline to make a certification and thus lose their grants, or risk making a certification that will be deemed false.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>As for the Termination Provision, the court held that CWIT would be unlikely to prove that the Termination Provision violates the First Amendment right to engage in protected speech and expressive conduct, or that it is impermissibly vague under the Fifth Amendment. The court did hold, however, that CWIT would likely to be able to prove that the application of the Termination Provision to one of CWIT\u2019s five federally funded grants violated separation of powers principles. Specifically, in the WANTO Act, \u201cCongress expressly stated . . . that the Executive \u2018<em>shall<\/em>\u2019 award grants for projects impacting women\u201d and required the \u201cDOL to issue equity-related grants.\u201d By \u201cexpressly requiring\u201d a \u201cwholesale termination\u201d of all equity-related grants, the included termination by the DOL of a WANTO grant would \u201cbypass Congress\u2019s condition and policy goal,\u201d according to the court.<\/p>\n<p>Accordingly, the court issued a nationwide injunction against the DOL\u2019s enforcement of the Certification Provision. As for the Termination Provision, the court found it \u201cappropriate to issue a preliminary injunction precluding DOL from terminating CWIT\u2019s WANTO grant funds,\u201d but otherwise did not issue a broader injunction. This comes on the heels of the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland\u2019s issuance of a preliminary injunction against the Certification and Termination Provisions in <em>National Association of Diversity Officers in Higher Education<\/em> v. <em>Trump<\/em>, which we discussed here, although that injunction was stayed on March 14, 2025, pending the government\u2019s appeal.<\/p>\n<p>Employers should continue to closely monitor the changing political and legal landscape in this area. The government is expected to appeal.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n\n\n<p><strong>Read More:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/child-support-lawyers-offering-free-consultations-in-scottsdale\/\">Child Support Lawyers Offering Free Consultations in Scottsdale: A Detailed Guide<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/best-child-support-lawyers-for-single-parents-in-scottsdale\/\">Finding the Best Child Support Lawyers for Single Parents in Scottsdale<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/criminal-defense-lawyers-with-payment-plans-in-ohio\/\">Criminal Defense Lawyers with Payment Plans in Ohio: What You Need to Know<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/miller-law-group-vs-usa-trusted-lawyers\/\">Miller Law Group vs USA Trusted Lawyers: Which California Law Firm Stands Out?<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/the-barnes-firm-and-usa-trusted-lawyers-in-nyc\/\">Choosing Between The Barnes Firm and USA Trusted Lawyers in NYC: A Detailed Review<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>On April 15, 2025, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois issued a preliminary injunction enjoining the U.S. Department of Labor (\u201cDOL\u201d) from implementing certain [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":9555,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[1838,1699,143,134,1851,7335,1945,554,1429,4593],"class_list":["post-9554","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-lawyers","tag-certification","tag-contractor","tag-court","tag-dei","tag-district","tag-dol","tag-enjoins","tag-federal","tag-implementation","tag-requirement"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9554","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9554"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9554\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9579,"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9554\/revisions\/9579"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9555"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9554"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9554"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9554"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}