A community for 'Whites only' in Arkansas sued for discrimination [View all]
Source: CNN US
PUBLISHED May 20, 2026, 10:45 PM ET
A remote settlement pegged as a “Whites-only” community in the Ozark Mountains of Arkansas is being sued for discrimination after rejecting a woman’s application to buy land there. Michelle Walker, who is of Jewish ancestry, says the organization that runs the community, Return to the Land, discriminated against her by denying her the opportunity to buy land based on race and religion. Walker is married to a Black man and has biracial children, her lawsuit says. She’s seeking unspecified damages, including punitive damages.
CNN visited the 160-acre settlement nestled deep in northern rural Arkansas last August. At the time, around 40 people were living in the community, and hundreds were applying to live there, Eric Orwoll, the president of Return to the Land, the private member association that organized the Arkansas community, told CNN.
To live in the community, Orwoll told CNN: “You have to be someone who identifies with your European heritage and ancestry. You have to celebrate traditional European values and we get those values from our religious documents within Christianity, within Norse paganism.” “We do view Jewish origins as having their roots in the near East, and so they wouldn’t fall under the category of European heritage,” Orwoll said last year.
Denying Walker’s application constitutes “blatant and brazen violations of long-standing federal and state fair housing laws,” the complaint states.
Read more: https://www.cnn.com/2026/05/20/us/arkansas-return-to-the-land-discrimination-lawsuit
Link to NAACP Legal Defense Fund PRESS RELEASE - Civil Rights Organizations File Lawsuit Against Whites-Only Housing Development in Arkansas
Link to SUIT (PDF) - https://www.naacpldf.org/wp-content/uploads/Walker-v.-Return-to-the-Land-Complaint.pdf
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