The Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) has closed a Biden-era civil rights investigation into how the Texas General Land Office (GLO) distributed of disaster mitigation funds, claiming the probe was politically motivated.
The GLO manages HUD’s Community Development Block Grant-Disaster Recovery funds for Texas. In March 2022, HUD’s Region VI Office of Fair Housing and Equal Opportunity (FHEO) determined the GLO discriminated against predominantly nonwhite communities in Southeast Texas when distributing over $4 billion in disaster mitigation funding.
However, this week HUD issued a statement announcing the FHEO reversed the earlier finding, stating the 2022 discrimination claims were “baseless and unfounded.” HUD added the GLO “complied with federal standards to administer a race-neutral competition for high-impact disaster mitigation projects.”
“President Trump is ending weaponization of the federal government against the American people,” said HUD Secretary Scott Turner, who is a Texas native. “But the Biden administration politicized enforcement of federal civil rights law and deprived rural communities of essential disaster mitigation funds. This was an affront to all Americans. At HUD we have a duty to provide all communities, whether urban, rural, or tribal, with timely support in times of need. I am proud to remedy a grievous wrong against the great people of Texas.”
