Two civil rights lawyers who spoke out about the Trump administration’s efforts to limit enforcement of the Fair Housing Act were removed from their posts on Monday morning and said they were escorted out of the Housing and Urban Development Department by administration staff.
Palmer Heenan, who has worked as a lawyer at the housing agency since October 2023, and Paul Osadebe, who has worked there as a lawyer since March 2021, were among six current and former employees of HUD’s fair housing office who told The New York Times last week that Trump political appointees had made it nearly impossible for them to do their jobs. Their roles enforcing the Fair Housing Act, a cornerstone of U.S. civil rights, involved investigating and prosecuting landlords, real estate agents, lenders and others accused of discriminating based on race, religion, gender, family status or disability. Since January, their office has faced drastic cuts and a series of new procedures that have stalled or stopped thousands of legal inquiries.
Letters, memos and internal documents reviewed by The New York Times show that the Trump administration has repeatedly referred to civil rights work in housing as “not a priority of the administration”; that lawyers have been blocked from communicating with clients without approval from a Trump appointee, and had been barred from citing some past housing civil rights cases when researching legal precedent for new prosecutions.
Last week, the lawyers also provided documentation and testimony to Senator Elizabeth Warren, the ranking Democrat on the Senate committee responsible for overseeing HUD.
In a statement Monday in response to the dismissals, Senator Warren called out both Donald Trump and the HUD secretary, Scott Turner, accusing them of “turning their backs on the American people” and “silencing those who are speaking out.”
On Monday, Mr. Heenan and Mr. Osadebe were both called in for unscheduled meetings. Mr. Heenan, whose two-year probationary employee status was set to be upgraded to full-time employee next month, was handed a letter that said he was fired.
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The post Two HUD civil rights lawyers were dismissed after raising concerns about Fair Housing Act enforcement. appeared first on New York Times.
