By Sarah N. Lynch
WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The Republican-controlled U.S. Senate on Thursday confirmed conservative lawyer Harmeet Dhillon, President Donald Trump’s choice to lead the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, in a 52-45 vote.
One Republican, Senator Lisa Murkowski from Alaska, voted no along with Democrats.
Dhillon will oversee criminal and civil work ranging from hate crime prosecutions and voting rights litigation, to investigating law enforcement agencies for engaging in patterns of discrimination.
Trump’s appointees have already made sweeping changes to the Civil Rights Division’s personnel and priorities.
Several of its top officials were reassigned to work in a new office focused on immigration investigations into “sanctuary cities.”
The department put the brakes on securing court-approved settlements with the Minneapolis and Louisville police departments to resolve civil rights investigations that were sparked by the police killings of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor.
Last week, it announced an unprecedented civil rights investigation into whether the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department is violating people’s Second Amendment gun rights.
Dhillon, a staunch Trump supporter, is the founder of the far-right Center for American Liberty.
At her confirmation hearing, she said she supports the Trump administration’s efforts to ban the use of diversity, equity and inclusion policies by government and private corporations, calling such programs “illegal and unconstitutional.”
Her nonprofit group says it advocates for the rights of Americans “left behind” by more traditional civil rights groups such as the NAACP LDF and the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights.
“Throughout her career, Harmeet has stood up consistently to protect our cherished Civil Liberties, including taking on Big Tech for censoring our Free Speech, representing Christians who were prevented from praying together during COVID, and suing corporations who use woke policies to discriminate against their workers,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform when he announced her nomination.
The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights criticized Dhillon’s nomination in a letter to the Senate Judiciary Committee.
“Her work supporting President Trump’s efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election, her vitriolic crusade against the transgender community, her staunch opposition to reproductive freedom, and her work protecting men accused of sexual harassment paint a disturbing picture of the kind of work we can expect from the Civil Rights Division if Ms. Dhillon is confirmed,” it wrote.
Earlier on Thursday, the Senate also confirmed Trump’s former attorney Dean John Sauer in a 52-45 party line vote to be Solicitor General, the Justice Department’s top lawyer in charge of defending the federal government in cases before the Supreme Court.
(Reporting by Sarah N. Lynch; additional reporting by Bo Erickson; Editing by Sonali Paul)
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