Decimating pathways: Attacks on federal employment
Historically, the federal workforce provided ample professional opportunities for Black Americans and a long-standing pathway to achieve middle-class employment. At a time when other avenues for Black employment were closed due to racial segregation, the federal service was among the first national workforces to integrate. Public sector work provided economic opportunities and stability for Black households with built-in safeguards against the discriminatory hiring practices rampant at the time. As a result, Black Americans have traditionally been overrepresented in the federal workforce when compared to broader labor participation—about 19 percent of the federal workforce was Black compared to about 14 percent of the overall population in the workforce, as of March 2024. Furthermore, Office of Personnel Management (OPM) data shows that Black employees made up as much as one-third or more of the staff at agencies such as the Department of Education, Treasury, and Housing and Urban Development. In addition, in 14 states, plus Washington D.C., Black Americans were at least one-fifth of the state’s federal workforce. The significant anchoring of benefits, job stability, upward mobility, and equal opportunity attracted thousands of Black federal employees to service for generations.
The Trump administration’s destabilizing effort to purge the federal workforce has represented an unprecedented assault. In the first months of 2025, stable career paths that allowed Black families to enter the middle class; purchase homes; send their children to college; and prepare to retire with dignity were eroded by haphazard cuts to the federal workforce. Fueled by Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) and executive orders banning diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility efforts (DEIA), the cuts have sent shockwaves through the workforce. In areas with heavy concentrations of Black federal workers, some level of economic fallout is expected for both the impacted families and communities where they reside. In the two wealthiest Black counties in America—Prince George’s and Charles County in Maryland, which are just outside of the District of Columbia—the pain from the Trump purge of Black federal employees is being acutely felt. As Maryland Gov. Wes Moore (D) stated:
The attacks from the Trump administration are not glancing blows. They’re direct strikes, and they’re direct strikes against the people of this state, and they’re direct strikes against the people of Prince George’s County.
These impacts are not just felt in our nation’s capital. Contrary to popular belief, the federal footprint stretches across all 50 states and crosses political ideology and geography. As a proof point, the states with the highest Black worker share of total federal employees were Georgia (43.8%), Louisiana (37.6%), Mississippi (34.8%), and Tennessee (34.6%). Thousands of Black families in countless communities across the country have used federal service to unlock access to the middle class—and they now have the same disorienting story to tell.
An acute impact on Black women
These sweeping cuts across public sector agencies have affected Black women in particular, as they are disproportionately represented in agencies that have been hit the hardest. For thousands of these women—some of whom may be the main breadwinners in their families—being forced out of the federal service after spending their professional lives building careers now puts them and their families at great financial risk. The impact is likely to be far-reaching, as they make up the majority of Black federal workers and account for 12 percent of the federal workforce overall—almost double their representation in the labor force. Though it is difficult to track fully since the Trump administration has pulled down much publicly available demographic data, some reporting suggests that agencies with high concentrations of women and Black workers were harder hit. Not only do these job cuts have immediate negative consequences for current wealth but they will also reduce potential retirement earnings.
A chilling effect on the private sector
All these actions in the public sector are occurring simultaneously with an equally broad pressure campaign by President Trump and conservative allies within the private sector. Trump’s executive orders imposed anti-DEIA requirements on federal contractors and threatened potential federal action against private sector organizations, which has led to retrenchment. Some employers have pulled back on initiatives for underrepresented groups that have helped Black middle-class workers get ahead, such as training opportunities, mentoring, and affinity/resource groups. The results could be long-lasting for Black workers, as research suggests that, without strong diversity initiatives, Black professionals may face limited career development opportunities and less advancement toward leadership due to persistent workplace and hiring discrimination. The anti-DEIA rhetoric has reignited a racist and harmful trope—“DEI-hire”—that has put Black professionals in the crosshairs of unnecessary degradation. Black middle-class professionals already faced additional headwinds when compared to their counterparts—and these harmful actions only leave them more exposed. Already, some experts are recognizing an “antagonistic posture against the Black workforce” that is showing up in troubling economic indicators. This includes the rise in Black unemployment to 7.2 percent in July 2025, up from 6.8 percent the prior month and 6.3 percent the prior year—with certain states seeing even higher numbers. Likewise, the recent reporting that nearly 300,000 Black women left the labor force in the second quarter of 2025 has raised alarm related to this shifting landscape.
Systemic assault on equal opportunity
Outside of the job market, Black Americans have relied on other means of equal opportunity to push themselves into the middle class. However, those avenues are also narrowing under a systemic assault from the Trump administration, as it purges policy levers that level the playing field. President Trump has used multiple executive orders to undermine various pathways to economic mobility—from higher education and small business development to housing and health care policies. The administration also systematically attacked legal mechanisms, such as disparate impact, that Black Americans and others use to challenge these inequities.
Obtaining a college education provides significant increases in lifetime earnings for Black Americans, making it an important pathway to economic mobility. However, this avenue is now under threat due to multiple factors, including rollbacks of DEI policies; the unpredictable threats of freezing and unfreezing critical education funding; and increasing pressure on historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) that have consistently propelled Black graduates into the middle class. The Trump administration is also targeting scholarships and other programs that provide opportunity to underrepresented students as well as increasing student loan costs, which will disproportionately impact Black students. These policies will add to the rising debt burden, and some borrowers who default may even see their wages and tax returns garnished, further undermining this avenue for economic progress. Likewise, the administration’s efforts to monitor and influence who gets access to postsecondary education and what those students are taught will likely have negative ripple effects.
Contrary to his claims of doing more for Black Americans than any other president—especially on the economy—Trump’s policies threaten to demolish tools that Black entrepreneurs relied on to build wealth and create jobs in their community for generations. A key proof point is the undermining of the Minority Business Development Agency (MBDA). Through policies adopted by presidents Richard Nixon and Jimmy Carter, MBDA became a crucial resource for minority-owned businesses, providing them with essential support that helped obtain access to funding and federal contracts. Legal activists funded by dark money groups allied with President Trump convinced a conservative court to dilute MBDA’s mandate to serve disadvantaged minority groups during the Biden administration. President Trump sought to shutter the agency and gut its efforts completely—seeking to fire nearly 100 percent of its staff; terminating grants; and closing its local business centers that helped Black entrepreneurs across the country. Though a federal court has issued a preliminary injunction to reverse these actions, the administration and its allies continue to undermine the agency. The president has even seemingly silenced Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC), who had previously been a vocal supporter of minority business development programs. In an effort to achieve oversight, Sens. Cantwell (D-WA), Baldwin (D-WI), and Blunt Rochester (D-DE) wrote to Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick demanding a full accounting of his actions to shutter the MBDA. Trump has likewise weakened the Small Business Administration’s (SBA) ability to help Black business owners. Additionally, his erratic tariff policies will bring rising costs and almost nonexistent avenues for exemption that threaten the survival of Black businesses and the trajectory of communities they anchor.
Continuing the blitz on the pathways to wealth, the Trump administration’s agenda is also making policy decisions that disadvantage Black middle-class families when it comes to the housing market—another core pillar upon which they build and pass down generational wealth. Black homeownership rates have continued to lag compared to white homeownership, with a 28 percent gap—wider than it did when discrimination was legal in the 1960s. This is driven by persistent systemic inequality, wealth gaps, disparities in lending and credit access, and lower home values and appreciation. The Trump administration has actively undermined policy solutions to address these issues. The administration revoked the Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing rule, a reworked Obama-era proposal to build on the promise of the Fair Housing and Civil Rights Acts that required localities to track and address patterns of segregation. Despite advocacy for the rule that stretches back more than a decade, Trump has railed against the effort, claiming that it would abolish the suburbs. The administration has also sought to roll back reforms that reduce disparities in home appraisals, which lead to a drag on Black wealth creation and quality of life. Recognizing the harm of this action some mortgage lenders are not following the president’s lead. Coupled with these policy rollbacks, Trump has also been slow to offer policy solutions that address rising costs for Black homeowners. And, with no new federal tools to help Black buyers obtain affordable housing, we could see the development of deeper residential segregation.
While the congressional Republicans and the president attempt to sell the controversial One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA), Black Americans are bracing for the impacts of the policy betrayals tucked into the bloated law. OBBBA builds upon a tax system that already disadvantages Black families by taxing wages more than wealth, and those structural downsides continue as a core tenet of the Trump tax cut extension. Likewise, OBBBA shuts out certain populations from accessing educational pathways that were previously open to everyone by implementing loan limits for graduate schools. Certain types of professional degrees, such as law, medicine, and dentistry can cost upwards of hundreds of thousands of dollars to an individual but promise strong postgraduate earnings and returns on investment. Since Black students hold higher student debt balances in pursuit of graduate and doctoral degrees, limiting loan amounts for student borrowers potentially blocks out certain students and demographics from attaining such degrees.
Conclusion
Despite President Trump’s past sales pitches and current claims to the contrary, his policy agenda for the Black middle class has been a bait and switch. These policies have the deliberate effect of erasing the Black middle class and making it unattainable for any future generation. The Trump administration has made deliberate policy choices that threaten Black middle-class families—perhaps that is why his support among Black Americans has collapsed so precipitously since returning to office. While interventions exist at the state and local level, it is clear that the real power to reverse these trends rests with Congress and the administration itself. Black families deserve partnership from the federal government that widens the doors of opportunity to build generational wealth and a secure future—not to have them slammed in their face by this administration.