Civil Rights Advocates Say DOJ Is Abandoning Its Core Mission For Gun Politics
The U.S. Department of Justice Civil Rights Division has launched a new office dedicated to Second Amendment issues, drawing immediate backlash from civil rights and racial justice advocates who argue the administration has abandoned core investigations into discrimination, voting rights, and unconstitutional policing.
The newly created Second Amendment Rights Section is framed as a defense of gun ownership, a priority long championed by conservatives, but critics say the move comes at the direct expense of the division’s actual mission.
Since returning to the White House, President Donald Trump has steered the Civil Rights Division away from its traditional role, reportedly dropping active investigations into racial discrimination and voting suppression, according to NPR.
Instead, under the leadership of Harmeet Dhillon, the division has been focused on Trump’s political agenda, from anti-trans sports initiatives to claims of anti-Christian bias and antisemitism.
Angela Angel, senior advisor for Black Lives Matter PAC, said the department is abandoning the very purpose Congress assigned it. “The Civil Rights Division was never designed to be a customer service desk for constitutional amendments. It was built to protect people from discrimination, voter suppression, unconstitutional policing, targeted government abuse, and state-sanctioned inequities,” Angel told theGrio.
She questioned what civil rights violation the new office is actually addressing. “It exists to safeguard the rights that are being violated, not the ones already receiving warm, continuous hugs from the Supreme Court.”
Angel, an attorney, emphasized that for a federal enforcement division to be justified, there must be a systemic deprivation of rights by government actors. She said that simply isn’t the case here.
“No one is hunting down lawful gun owners and confiscating their weapons. There is no epidemic of states discriminating against people for wanting to own a firearm,” she said. Courts at every level, she noted, have spent the past decade expanding Second Amendment protections, not restricting them.
She also raised a deeper legal issue: the office may not even be authorized to exist. The Civil Rights Division was created by Congress with a statutory mandate outlining its enforcement power. Voting rights, housing discrimination, disability protections, educational access, and policing are all grounded in congressional authority.
The Second Amendment is not. “Without congressional authorization, this new office risks becoming the legal equivalent of one of those shiny holiday gifts that looks impressive under the tree but reveals itself as flimsy and useless the moment you actually try to do anything with it. Cute for the photo op. Worthless in practice,” Angel said.
The timing has also raised eyebrows, given the country’s ongoing gun violence crisis that has left hundreds of thousands of Americans dead over the past decade. Rather than addressing the nation’s actual public safety emergency, Angel argued the DOJ is performing for its political benefactors.
“Let’s call this what it is: payment on a political debt. The NRA and gun lobby backed this administration, poured millions into campaigns, and now they’re collecting their return on investment. Not in the form of actual policy that helps gun owners, but in the form of a shiny new office that makes it look like something is being done. It’s governance as performance art, designed to satisfy donors rather than serve citizens,” she said.
NAACP President and CEO Derrick Johnson issued his own critique, warning that the administration is ignoring urgent national needs. “In America, it is easier to obtain a gun than to access emergency care for a gunshot wound,” Johnson told theGrio.
“While the Trump Administration scrambles to maintain the support of its MAGA base, it continues to tank the economy, and sideline education and healthcare.” He added that working Americans are already overwhelmed by rising costs. “We don’t need performative gestures. We need to confront the compounding crises affecting the American people.”
Angel pushed back on the suggestion that opposition to the new office is rooted in anti-gun sentiment. She pointed to a long history of armed self-defense in Black communities.
“From the Black Panthers who exercised armed self-defense against police brutality to the Deacons for Defense and Justice who protected civil rights workers, from everyday community members to Vice President Kamala Harris herself, it’s not unusual for us to value self-defense and constitutional rights,” she explained. The issue, she said, is about being “pro-law, pro-sense, and pro-reality.”
Instead of confronting real inequities, she argued, the DOJ has created a political distraction designed to shift headlines. “If the Trump administration were genuinely concerned about the civil rights of Americans, there are real crises waiting for attention,” she said.
“Instead, we are watching a political distraction dressed up as legal principle, designed to shift headlines rather than serve the American people. Americans asked for relief and stability. What they received instead was a press release and a diversion.”
