The Donald Trump administration has taken decisive action to dismantle a controversial Biden-era diversity mandate at the Department of Housing and Urban Development, formally terminating a federal agreement that critics said injected racial preferences into the home appraisal industry.
HUD officials confirmed the agreement, reached under the previous administration, has been scrapped, marking a sharp reversal in federal housing policy. The deal sought to reshape appraisal practices in response to claims of racism and racial disparities, but industry professionals and Trump administration officials argued it pressured appraisers to weigh race over objective market data when determining home values.
2025 IN REVIEW:
DEI is dead at HUD, putting all Americans back on a level playing field.
HUD disbanded the woke PAVE task force and held local leaders accountable for illegal race-based housing plans.pic.twitter.com/OF8BfzTEYd
— Department of Housing and Urban Development (@HUDgov) December 31, 2025
Property appraisals play a central role in the American housing system, and HUD leadership said the prior approach undermined that foundation. “Property appraisals are an integral component of helping Americans realize the dream of homeownership,” Trump HUD Secretary Scott Turner said in a statement. “But the Biden Administration weaponized the Fair Housing Act to inject DEI into the appraisal industry, focusing on illegal race preferences rather than ensuring every American has equal access to quality, affordable housing.” Turner added, “Today, HUD is ending the politicalization of property appraisals to restore fairness and equality to civil rights enforcement and housing.”
The Trump administration also argued the Biden-era action was not grounded in evidence of actual racial discrimination within the appraisal profession. Officials said the policy relied instead on a disparate-impact analysis that found appraisers were statistically more likely to be white than Black — a demographic finding they contended does not, by itself, demonstrate unlawful bias or discriminatory conduct.
That critique was echoed by Fair Housing and Equal Opportunity Assistant Secretary Craig Trainor, who sharply criticized the previous administration’s enforcement priorities. “Rather than focus on real people with real fair housing issues, President Biden’s HUD focused on the racial composition of the appraisal industry,” Trainor said in a statement. “Weaponizing disparate impact theory, the ideological enforcers in Biden’s Office of Fair Housing and Equal Opportunity forced racial preferencing into the appraisal qualification protocols.”
“That is not only overreach, but it does not serve the American people,” Trainor added. “HUD is back in the business of promoting excellence and ensuring equal treatment before the law.”
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The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) has been hijacked by woke/DEI activists who want to implement DEI in everything HUD does including hiring, promotion, and housing programs.
Let’s take a close look at the complete woke takeover of HUD.
A thread🧵 pic.twitter.com/XBxGabjcOI
— Wokal Distance (@wokal_distance) May 21, 2024
In a separate letter notifying the Appraisal Foundation of the agreement’s termination, Trainor detailed how enforcement resources were used under the prior policy. “Based on its obsession with disparate impact theory, the Biden Administration’s FHEO expended finite enforcement resources poring over data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics to determine the racial composition of persons in the appraisal industry,” he wrote. “When it discovered the high ‘percentage of [w]hite persons in the [appraisal] occupation,’ FHEO deemed this a problem to which it would provide a coercive government solution.”
Trainor also underscored the stakes for everyday homeowners. “For most American homeowners, their largest financial asset is their home,” he wrote. “The necessity of having competent appraisers assess the value of their property should not ordinarily generate controversy.”
Trump administration officials said the Biden-era framework also targeted the appraisal industry’s long-standing apprenticeship model, arguing through disparate-impact theory that the traditional training system “perpetuates racial homogeneity in the appraisal profession.” Trump administration officials rejected that conclusion, saying the apprenticeship process exists to ensure technical competence, accuracy, and professional integrity — not to engineer demographic outcomes.
The terminated agreement stemmed from a Biden-era settlement following allegations of bias in home valuations. Under that framework, appraisal organizations and lenders faced new training requirements, expanded oversight, and enforcement pressure that critics said prioritized identity-based outcomes over property fundamentals such as comparable sales, location, and condition.
Housing professionals welcomed the Trump administration’s decision, saying it restores clarity and stability to an industry that depends on consistency and data-driven analysis. Appraisers warned the previous policy risked distorting valuations, inflating prices, and exposing homeowners, buyers, and lenders to unnecessary financial and legal risk.
Donald Trump administration officials emphasized that fair housing laws remain fully enforced and that discrimination in housing remains illegal. However, they stressed that enforcing civil rights does not require racial engineering or mandates that compromise professional independence and market integrity.
As the Trump administration continues reshaping federal housing policy, the HUD decision stands as a clear signal that fairness, objectivity, and equal treatment will guide enforcement — ensuring home values are determined by sound data and professional standards, not ideological theory.
