The US Supreme Court will hear a case on November 30 that could shape who is allowed to enforce civil rights in the United States. The justices will consider whether employees of federally funded universities can sue under Title IX over alleged workplace sex discrimination. The Trump administration has asked the court to rule that they cannot, arguing that Congress never gave university employees a private right to bring such claims.
The commentary argues that the case is part of a wider legal effort to narrow the ability of individuals and advocacy groups to take rights violations to court themselves. In June, the Supreme Court declined to hear a challenge to an appeals court ruling that barred Arkansas United, an immigrant advocacy organisation, from suing to enforce protections for voters who need help at the polls. Across a growing number of cases, Republican-led states and the Trump administration are pushing a common principle: unless Congress clearly authorises private suits, enforcement should largely rest with the government.
Private lawsuits and the question of who enforces rights
The author writes that the issue may sound technical, but its consequences are significant. If individuals and civil rights groups cannot go to court when protective laws are broken, the power to decide which rights get enforced shifts toward the government, which may itself be the party violating or ignoring them.
A private right of action lets individuals, or groups acting for them, file lawsuits to enforce rights protected by law. Such suits can seek compliance or compensation for past violations. Under US federal and state law, these rights are not automatic. Lawmakers sometimes explicitly permit private suits, and where they do not, courts must decide whether a law implicitly allows them.
The commentary notes that private litigation has been central to enforcing rights for much of US history. It quotes University of Virginia law professor George Rutherglen, who wrote in a 2015 law review article that civil rights are “quintessentially private rights, whose exercise and enforcement should depend primarily on the initiative of the individuals who bear those rights.” He also said public enforcement remains necessary but cannot fully replace individual control over those rights.
Court rulings that narrowed private enforcement
Supporters of private rights of action, including AARP, see them as an effective way for vulnerable people to defend their rights when government agencies are unwilling or unable to act. Critics, including the US Chamber of Commerce Institute for Legal Reform, argue that private lawsuits can encourage frivolous litigation. The commentary says these critics, often from the political right, have sought to limit private suits through legal arguments.
The article points to the 2001 Alexander v Sandoval decision, in which a Supreme Court majority led by Justice Antonin Scalia ruled that Title VI did not give private parties the right to enforce regulations against policies with a disparate impact on protected groups. It also cites a 2021 voting rights case, in which Justice Neil Gorsuch, joined by Justice Clarence Thomas, questioned in a one-paragraph concurrence whether the Voting Rights Act of 1965 provides an implied cause of action. The article notes that this issue was not raised in that case.
The article also says the trend has reached other areas. In June, the Supreme Court ruled against Falun Gong practitioners who had accused Cisco Systems of helping the Chinese government develop surveillance technology used against them. The court concluded they could not pursue aiding-and-abetting claims under the federal laws they had invoked.
Voting rights cases test access to the courts
The commentary describes voting rights as one of the most serious areas affected. In the Arkansas United case, the Eighth Circuit ruled that the group could not sue on behalf of non-native English speakers over language assistance in the voting booth. The ruling concerned Section 208 of the Voting Rights Act, but the article says it extended a broader argument that private individuals and advocacy groups cannot enforce key provisions of that law. The Supreme Court’s refusal to hear the case left that ruling in place.
The same argument has been raised by Republican-led governments in two redistricting and vote-dilution cases, Board of Election Commissioners v NAACP in Mississippi and Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa Indians v Howe in North Dakota. In May, the Supreme Court vacated judgments in both cases and sent them back for reconsideration in light of its ruling in Louisiana v Callais, without deciding the private-enforcement question. The article says the Callais decision sharply raised the bar for some racial vote-dilution claims. It adds that some governments are also arguing that only the Department of Justice can bring such voting rights actions.
The article warns that as private suits are curtailed, federal law enforcement increasingly depends on decisions made by the executive branch.
A Clean Air Act case and the Justice Department’s role
The commentary says the Trump administration is also pursuing another route. The Clean Air Act explicitly gives private citizens the right to bring certain lawsuits. Even so, the Justice Department has moved to intervene and dismiss a case against xAI over allegations that gas turbines at its power facility in Southaven, Mississippi, violate federal environmental law and pollute nearby communities. The facility powers xAI’s Colossus 2 data centre in nearby Memphis.
In September, the Justice Department appealed to the Fifth Circuit and sought to halt the case. According to the article, the department argued that letting the suit proceed would threaten national security and the US push for global leadership in AI. The author writes that the question here is not whether Congress created a right to sue, since it did, but whether the executive branch can still step in when a case conflicts with its priorities.
The article further argues that relying on the Justice Department alone is risky. It says the department has been used to target political opponents of President Trump, and that its Civil Rights Division has shifted away from defending racial and ethnic minorities toward cases brought by white plaintiffs alleging so-called “reverse discrimination.” The commentary suggests that even if a future administration reverses these changes, a system that depends heavily on one federal agency with limited resources and political oversight would remain vulnerable.
To illustrate the point, the article cites Democracy Docket, which it says noted in 2024 that only five of the 216 active voting rights and redistricting cases it was tracking were brought by the Justice Department. The author concludes that the erosion of private rights of action is happening case by case, and that politicians, civil liberties advocates and organisations need to push back before more enforcement routes are closed.
