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DEI in Companies: Context, Evolution, and Controversies - Coggle Diagram

- - - - terminate, to the maximum extent allowed by law, all DEI, DEIA, and “environmental justice” offices and positions (including but not limited to “Chief Diversity Officer” positions); all “equity action plans,” “equity” actions, initiatives, or programs, “equity-related” grants or contracts; and all DEI or DEIA performance requirements for employees, contractors, or grantees.
      - Trump executive action
        ENDING ILLEGAL DISCRIMINATION AND
        RESTORING MERIT-BASED OPPORTUNITY
        Illegal DEI and DEIA policies not only violate the text and spirit of our longstanding Federal civil-rights laws, they also undermine our national unity, as they deny, discredit, and undermine the traditional American values of hard work, excellence, and individual achievement in favor of an unlawful, corrosive, and pernicious identity-based spoils system. Hardworking Americans who deserve a shot at the American Dream should not be stigmatized, demeaned, or shut out of opportunities because of their race or sex.
        These illegal DEI and DEIA policies also threaten the safety of American men, women, and children across the Nation by diminishing the importance of individual merit, aptitude, hard work, and determination when selecting people for jobs* White House
        
        Strategic Report: The Attorney General, working with other agency leaders and the Director of OMB, must submit a detailed report to the President's Domestic Policy Advisor.
        This report should include: Identify industries where DEI-related discrimination is suspected, Name the worst offenders in each sector, Suggest steps to stop illegal DEI programs, Suggest possible lawsuits, government interventions, or official legal positions the federal government could take.
      - Legal impact?
        
        EEOC CASE
        
        Andrea R. Lucas, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission’s Acting Chair appointed by President Trump, sent public letters to 20 law firms on March 17, 2025. The letters ask the firms to provide the EEOC with extensive information about their diversity, equity and inclusion practices. The former EEOC officials rebuked Lucas’ actions as an illegal abuse of power.Forbes
        
        Lucas also asks each firm to provide a “searchable Excel spreadsheet,” listing the name, sex, race, phone number, email address, and other information about every law student or attorney who applied to the firm since 2019. She seeks additional information for individuals who were actually hired.
        
        The EEOC is supposed to operate as a bipartisan, independent agency but on January 27, 2025, President Trump fired two of the three Democratic EEOC and elected the president
        
        19/03/2025 Published a guide on: What To Do If You Experience Discrimination Related to DEI at Work EEOC
        
        that addresses also the fact that "Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) is a broad term that is not defined in Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (Title VII)"
        Plus it states: " The EEOC’s position is that there is no such thing as “reverse” discrimination; there is only discrimination."
        
        Federal court issued a temporary restraining order regarding two executive order provisions governing DEI programs for certain grant recipients of federal funds Link Litter
        
        What Happened?
        A nonprofit group called Chicago Women in Trades (CWT) filed a lawsuit against two executive orders (EO 14151 and EO 14173) issued by President Trump.
        On March 27, 2025, a federal judge in Illinois issued a Temporary Restraining Order (TRO
        
        Reasons for judge decision: The court said the government didn’t define what counts as "illegal DEI" or what would violate federal anti-discrimination laws -> That puts organizations in an impossible spot — either risk being punished, lose funding, or self-censor.
        The judge found the Termination Provision could suppress free speech by scaring people away from saying or doing anything related to DEI.
        
        Executive Order 14151 § 2(b)(i) (the “Termination Provision”) mandates each agency within 60 days “terminate, to the maximum extent allowed by law, . . . all . . . “equity-related” grants or contracts.”
        Executive Order 14173 § 3(b)(iv) (the “Certification Provision”) mandates each agency include in every contract or grant award a certification “that it does not operate any programs promoting DEI that violate any applicable Federal anti-discrimination laws” and thus such certification be “material” for purposes of the False Claims Act.
    - - Ending DEI Roles, Departments, and Teams -> PepsiCo, Meta, and Harley-Davidson eliminated their Chief DEI Officer or equivalent roles, Boeing dissolved its entire global DEI department
        
        Eliminating DEI Hiring Goals and Practices -> McDonald’s, Google, Citigroup, PepsiCo, Meta, and Goldman Sachs have ended diversity hiring targets or diverse hiring slate requirements
        
        Withdrawing from External DEI Surveys or Indexes -> Ford, Lowe’s, Target, McDonald’s, Walmart, PepsiCo, Meta, Accenture, Google, and Citigroup are stopping participation in surveys like the Human Rights Campaign’s Corporate Equality Index and similar external assessments Fortune.
      - SHRM’s decision to drop the ‘E’ from ‘DE&I’ WorkLife
    - - Views of DEI have become slightly more negative among U.S. workers - November 19, 2024
        Pew Research
        :
        47% of White adults say DEI practices in the workplace hurt White men.
        
        Littler’s Inclusion, Equity and Diversity C-Suite Survey Report 2025 -> comparison 2024-2025 and pre-after Trump Litter
        
        the tendency started with In 2023, a Supreme Court ruling that race-based college admissions targets were illegal built a precedent Newsweek
  - - - Ceasing Sponsorship of Cultural and Pride Events -> Tractor Supply, Deere and Co., Lowe’s, and others have stopped sponsoring or participating in events like Pride festivals or voting campaigns.
        Withdrawing from DEI-Linked Philanthropy -> Walmart ended its $100 million commitment to its racial equity center.
        Ending Supplier Diversity Programs -> Meta, Harley-Davidson, and Target are pivoting from supplier diversity toward broader or small-business-focused engagement.
  - - - We can’t debate its merits when we don’t agree on what it is.
        These failures to communicate flow from the fact that DEI has no universal or broadly shared definition. The problem with DEI begins with its most basic definition: “diversity, equity, and inclusion.” Each of those terms can be defined in conflicting ways. The Atlantic
        
        In the past, DEI vagueness gave the left cover to implement ideas that would have risked rejection if evaluated on their own specific terms. The DEI label failed to distinguish between policies that aroused little opposition from those that were unpopular and the effective form the ineffective ones.
        
        the groundwork for the Trump coalition to go to the opposite extreme: Today’s undifferentiated attacks on “DEI” are as vague. Vagueness that it's allowing to attact both policies that people critique and those that people support unconditionally
        
        SUGGESTION OF "TABOO" THE DEI
        The AI researcher and writer Eliezer Yudkowsky urges “tabooing” words to help clarify their meaning. “When you find yourself in philosophical difficulties, the first line of defense is not to define your problematic terms, but to see whether you can think without using those terms at all,” he has written. Simply “blank out the forbidden words and all their obvious synonyms,” he advised, and summon “the actual details” until you can replace the symbols with the substance.
        
        e.g. critique to the Federal Aviation Administration for inclusive recruitment (disability) led to an accident
    - - Harvard pursued diversity in admissions, for example, by systematically treating Asian applicants inequitably.
        Harvard Rated Asian-American Applicants Lower on Personality Traits, Suit NYtimes
    - - Edward Blum = lawyer
        Stephen Miller=lawyer
        Robby Starbuck = influencer
        Conservative think tanks and activist groups: American Alliance for Equal Rights, Alliance for Fair Board Recruitment, America First Legal , Heritage Foundation (attact to anti-colonial programming) Fortune