DOJ: Making fun of boys wearing makeup is illegal

The Civil Rights Division has struck again. This time the target was Mohawk Central School District in upstate New York. The CRD's involvement was needed because students had been mean to another of their fellow students who had made some interesting life choices.

On Jan. 14, 2010, in the Northern District of New York, the United States sought to join a lawsuit filed by the New York Civil Liberties Union on behalf of a student, J.L., who was the alleged victim of severe and pervasive student-on-student harassment based on sex. According to the United States’ motion, J.L. failed to conform to gender stereotypes in both behavior and appearance. He exhibited feminine mannerisms, dyed his hair, wore makeup and nail polish, and maintained predominantly female friendships. The United States alleged that the harassment against J.L. escalated from derogatory name-calling to physical threats and violence.

Of course bullying is always wrong, but it's also a natural consequence of grade school. Students are insulted and beat up on the playground for being fat, thin, geeky, snide, poor at sports, and everything in between. If J.L. chooses to be transgendered, it's illegal to discriminate against him as far as things like hiring go. But bullying at school is a much different story. J.L. was awarded $50,000 for the incident.

The Civil Rights Division's lawsuit technically has merit under Title IX of the Civil Rights Act. But to use it to criminalize schoolyard bullying stretches the law in a very dangerous direction.

Civil Rights Division sues over 21+ apartment age requirement

Another Friday, another dump of outrageous press releases from the Justice Department Civil Rights Division, thanks to its leadership under race-baiting radical Thomas Perez. This one particularly stood out.

Under the terms of the consent decree, filed today in federal court in Scranton, Pa., defendants Gerard Joyce, Katie Joyce, Daniel Joyce, Normandy Holdings LLC, Lofts at the Mill LP and Lofts GP LLC, are required to pay $35,000 in monetary relief to two victims of discrimination and to the United States.

The department’s complaint, which originated from an investigation by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), alleged that the owners, property managers and management company for "The Mill" luxury apartments violated the Fair Housing Act by refusing to rent apartments to persons with children and by advertising discriminatory, "21 years or older," tenant policies in multiple Scranton newspapers. On Nov. 16, 2009, the court granted the United States’ motion for summary judgment on liability.

The Fair Housing Act does forbid housing discrimination, but I'm not sure banning 16-year-olds was what they had in mind. The Mill apartments don't allow children specifically because they're geared toward recent college graduates and are attempting to attract a younger crowd. The lawsuit has been settled and The Mill has agreed to pay a total of $35,000 in penalties. They learned the lesson the hard way: In Barack Obama's America, you don't have the right to do business your own way.

Education Secretary plays the race card

Education Secretary Arne Duncan was in Selma on Monday to commemorate the civil rights march that took place there. In a speech, Duncan said that the problems plaguing our public schools weren't due to teachers unions or low standards, but too much discipline against African-American students.

In a speech commemorating the 1965 “Bloody Sunday” civil rights protest in Selma, Ala., Education Secretary Arne Duncan referred to certain failing public schools in America as “dropout factories” and places that “seem to suspend and discipline only young African-American boys.”

“The achievement gap in our country is shameful,” Duncan said on Monday. He said some public schools are discriminating against students because of their race, gender, or disability by limiting their access to advanced and college preparatory classes. “Fifty-six years after Brown v. Board of Education, 45 years after Bloody Sunday, the achievement gap is still a cancer that imperils our national progress.”

Duncan is acting on behalf of teachers' unions like the National Education Association which want to see more federal prosecutions under Title VI of the 1964 Civil Rights Act. Title VI forbids institutions receiving federal assistance to discriminate on the basis of race, particularly schools. Duncan's words mirror the actions of the DOJ Civil Rights Division, which has aggressively prosecuted alleged cases of discrimination. If Duncan gets his way, the result could be an increase in civil rights prosecutions against schools. Schools could be targeted if Duncan feels that too many black children are being disciplined there, for example.

Before coming to Washington, Duncan was CEO of the Chicago Public Schools under Governor Rod Blagojevich. The CPS ranked 49th out of 50th in state-by-state ratings.

Justice Department looking forward to causing another mortgage meltdown

Our favorite racist activist lawyers at the Justice Department Civil Rights Division are back. Last week, the CRD reached a settlement with two subsidiaries of American International Group (AIG) for at least $6.1 million. (Talk about kicking a dead horse.) The lawsuit, as with almost every lawsuit brought by the Civil Rights Division, was based on race.

The settlement was filed today in conjunction with a complaint made by the Justice Department in U.S. District Court in Delaware. Brought under the federal Fair Housing and Equal Credit Opportunity Acts, the complaint alleges African American borrowers nationwide were charged higher fees on wholesale loans made by AIG Federal Savings Bank (FSB) and Wilmington Finance Inc. (WFI), an affiliated mortgage lending company.

AIG didn't intentionally charge African-Americans with higher fees. The CRD's complaint was on the basis of disparate impact, which bans lending practices where the intent isn't discriminatory but the outcome is. What probably happens is that black homeowners are charged more by insurance companies in general, not because of their race, but because the actuaries assess this demographic as being poorer and a higher risk.

Maybe the CRD thinks we should just crash the entire housing industry all over again? The single largest factor in the housing bubble collapse was the Community Reinvestment Act, which mandated that a certain percentage of loans be made to minorities. The hope was that more blacks and Latinos would end up able to purchase homes. The result was that mortgage companies were forced to make countless subprime loans that couldn't be paid back. This pumped more and more air into the bubble until it finally popped.

The CRD proudly announced that this is the first time a mortgage company has been sued based on racial factors and that it won't be the last. Under disparate impact, they can sue pretty much any company that charges an average of one cent more for minorities than whites. The Obama Administration and its executioners have, it seems, learned nothing.

Civil Rights Division thinks American citizenship is racist

The good people of Georgia are still subjected to an old provision in the Voting Rights Act of 1965 that requires them to get permission from the Justice Department to change state voting laws. The antiquated law was meant to prevent southern states from trying to limit blacks' right to vote. It's never caused any problems, until Obama's DOJ came to town.

A new law passed in Georgia would require new voters to present a driver's license and Social Security Number when they register to vote. It's to an effort to keep illegal immigrants off the voting rolls. The DOJ's notorious Civil Rights Division jumped in and refused to approve the law because it "unfairly burdened a disproportionate number of minorities."

Yes, Obama's government is actually arguing that presenting proof of American citizenship is racist.

It's unclear whether the CRD is doing this because illegal immigrants are a key Democrat constituency or because the CRD is populated by race-baiting radicals. (Probably a combination of both.) But Georgia is fed up. In a courageous move, Georgia Secretary of State Brian Kemp announced the state will be suing the Justice Department to get the law passed. "The State of Georgia will no longer watch the Obama Justice Department play politics with our election processes and protections," Kemp said. This is the first time that anyone has stood up to the Civil Rights Division's racial bullying and we at ObamaWatchNews wish Kemp all the best.

Sotomayor law is the norm at the Justice Department

Remember the Ricci v. DiStefano case in New Haven? The test scores of white and Hispanic firefighters seeking to become sergeants were thrown out by the city after not enough blacks passed. The firefighters sued and Sonia Sotomayor, then a District Court judge and wise Latina, ruled in favor of New Haven. The Supreme Court disagreed and overturned her defense of discrimination.

The controversy that followed almost ruined Sotomayor's chances of sitting on the Supreme Court. You'd think the Justice Department would get the message that these so-called "disparate impact" cases, usually brought against police and fire departments, are a bad idea. Instead the nutty Thomas Perez, who heads up the DOJ's Civil Rights Division, gave a speech last week downplaying the Ricci case. He also bragged about lawsuits filed against a Department of Corrections in Massachusetts and a sheriff's office in Oklahoma, among others. The offense of all these defendants is that they were judging others based on their merit rather than their sex or skin color.

The Oklahoma case is particularly hilarious. The Sheriff of Bryan County was reassigning pregnant female confinement officers to desk duty while they were pregnant. The Justice Department hit them with a discrimination rap. Now, the Bryan County sheriff's office has to provide mandatory training against "pregnancy discrimination."

Welcome to BHO's America, where "diversity" is more important than law enforcement keeping us safe, and the lunatics have taken over the asylum.

Surprise! More wicked hypocrisy from the Justice Department

Today's instance comes from the Civil Rights Division (another shocker). The DOJ has refused to investigate ACORN. It has swept the Black Panthers' revolting voter intimidation in Philadelphia under the rug. But when some loser at his computer threatens La Raza, the big guns come out.

Vincent Johnson of Brick, New Jersey stands charged with sending threatening e-mails to several pro-amnesty illegal immigrant groups, including La Raza, the Puerto Rican Legal Defense Fund, and the League of United Latin American Citizens. The e-mails contain violent threats, but they could have easily been handled by state police. "Nutjob Sends Threatening E-mails" isn't exactly a shocking development. Most political organizations get them every day.

But when Obama's cronies at La Raza are under attack, you can be sure the entire Civil Rights Division will swing into action. (Republican voters in Philadelphia are a different story.) Of course, this entire case has nothing to do with civil rights. The e-mails threaten illegal aliens, not Hispanics. File this under "Hypocrisy" while we stare at our watches and wait for the DOJ to lift a finger against ACORN.