Order from President Donald Trump aims to end 'radical and wasteful' diversity programs

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump on Tuesday night issued a sweeping executive order that aims to end all affirmative action and diversity programs in the federal government and in the private sector, an unprecedented action civil rights groups vowed to fight.

Trump said in the order that he seeks to eliminate the "immoral race- and sex-based preferences" that President Lyndon Johnson first instituted six decades ago to address long-standing racism and sexism that had denied many people jobs, contracts and education.

The order requires the federal executive branch to not only terminate all of its race- and gender-conscious government hiring and contracting programs but also to combat similar efforts in the private sector and higher education.

Trump has moved swiftly to eradicate what he called "radical and wasteful" programs, ordering the shutdown of federal DEI offices and putting their staffers on leave Wednesday, facing either a layoff or transfer to another job.

Foes of race- and gender-based programs were pleased. But supporters of affirmative action and "diversity, equity and inclusion," or DEI, and DEIA, which adds "accessibility," said Trump’s order did not surprise them but that they were gearing up to challenge it.

"President Trump’s executive order promises sweeping and dramatic changes in the public and private sectors," said Ed Whelan, a legal scholar with the conservative Ethics and Public Policy Center and a longtime critic of race-based affirmative action and DEI.

"The order recognizes that DEI is a guise that businesses and universities used to violate federal laws that bar discrimination on the basis of race and sex," Whelan said.

Khalid Pitts, senior adviser to the president of the Leadership Conference for Civil and Human Rights, said many of the coalition’s 240 civil and human rights organizations have discussed the next steps.

"This is not our first rodeo with laws, congressional actions, regulations or policies that are going to try to undermine the hard-fought civil rights," Pitts told Newsday. "This is going to be challenged in the court of public opinion, and this will be challenged in our courts."

Three executive orders

In his inaugural address Monday, Trump said, "This week, I will also end the government policy of trying to socially engineer race and gender into every aspect of public and private life. We will forge a society that is colorblind and merit based."

He has issued three executives orders aimed at ending the use of race, gender and other factors in federal hiring and contracting. The first two, issued Monday, revoked executive orders on DEI and affirmative action — many issued by President Joe Biden — and targeted DEI offices for closing.

The third executive order, issued Tuesday, describes all affirmative preferences based on race and gender as "illegal discrimination" because federal civil rights laws bar discrimination based on "race, color, religion, sex or national origin."

That order also aims to pressure the private sector and colleges and universities into abandoning race- and gender-based diversity and affirmative action programs.

The order gives the U.S. attorney general and the Office of Management and Budget 120 days to submit a report on how to "encourage" the private sector to go colorblind, potentially with a heavy hand.

The report must identify the "most egregious" DEI practitioners in "nine sectors of concern," up to nine publicly traded corporations, large nonprofits, big foundations, bar and medical associations, and wealthy colleges and universities — all targeted for possible litigation and regulatory action.

Several corporations already have pulled back their DEI programs, including Walmart, Ford Motor Company, Harley-Davidson, Loews and Molson Coors.

The order also gives the attorney general and the Education Department secretary 120 days to issue guidance to colleges and universities on how to comply with the 2023 Supreme Court ruling that found using an applicant's race as a factor in admissions decisions is unconstitutional.

Reactions

People who do DEI work expressed a range of questions and concerns.

"The executive order is very broadly written, even though the underlying aim is quite clear," said Tiffany Graham, a law professor and associate dean for diversity and inclusion at Touro Law Center in Central Islip.

"But once the regulators sit down and say, ‘What can we legally do? What can we not do legally,’ then we will have a crystal clear picture of what the landscape looks like," Graham said. "We'll have a better sense of whether or not the regulations are in compliance with federal law, or whether or not they can successfully be challenged."

Pitts said Leadership Conference members are reviewing the executive orders for possible litigation, noting that they lack clarity, defy common sense and in some cases appear illegal.

"You can't undo a law with an executive order and some of the federal practices around diversity that the federal government has done for decades upon decades have been upheld by Congress or the courts," he said. "He can't just undo them."

Paule Pachter, CEO of Long Island Cares, a major food bank that contracts with the U.S. Department of Agriculture to buy food, said, "There has always been a strong focus on diversity, equity and inclusion in nonprofit organizations."

He said, "We look to make sure our staff is diversified to the point where they can identify with the communities that they support."

He pointed out a practical consideration, like making sure Spanishspeakers staff a Freeport outreach program whose clientele is 52% Hispanic. "We hired based on experience, not race," Pachter said.

Laura Harding, president of ERASE Racism, a Syosset-based civil rights organization whose work includes organizational trainings covering DEI, said Trump’s orders sought "unnatural control over our private corporations and institutions."

Harding said DEI had been misunderstood as promoting quotas for hiring or admission when the reality meant "expanding places where they’re getting resumes from and finding qualified people" as a result.

Already, some companies are pulling back on DEI work, she said. "People are not even waiting for orders — they’re falling in line," she said. "A large number of highly qualified people are literally losing their jobs."

But Graham said diversity and affirmative action are still needed. "We're still working 60 years later because it is just not enough time to work through hundreds of years of discrimination."