What did top law firms agree to behind closed doors? The EEOC won't say

Two law professors are suing the EEOC, demanding it release the secret settlement agreements behind its sweeping crackdown on BigLaw DEI programs.

The lawsuit, filed on February 16, 2026, in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, asks the court to force the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission to hand over records it has refused to produce for months. At stake are the undisclosed terms of deals the agency struck with some of the world's largest law firms over their diversity, equity, and inclusion practices — terms that could reshape how every employer in the country thinks about DEI.

The dispute goes back to March 2025, when President Donald Trump signed an executive order directing the EEOC to scrutinize major law firms for consistency with Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Within days, EEOC Acting Chair Andrea Lucas fired off letters to twenty law firms questioning their DEI programs. The letters, according to the filing, were based entirely on publicly available information. None indicated the firms had been investigated or charged with anything.

By April 2025, four firms — Kirkland & Ellis LLP, Latham & Watkins LLP, Simpson Thacher & Bartlett LLP, and A&O Shearman Sterling, LLC — had signed settlement agreements with the agency. The lawsuit also alleges that Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP; Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher and Flom LLP; and...

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