Trump’s Merit-Based DEI Executive Order Is A Sledgehammer

The purpose of the Merit-Based EO is to bring various institutions into alignment with existing anti-discrmination laws:

Yet today, roughly 60 years after the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, critical and influential institutions of American society, including the Federal Government, major corporations, financial institutions, the medical industry, large commercial airlines, law enforcement agencies, and institutions of higher education have adopted and actively use dangerous, demeaning, and immoral race- and sex-based preferences under the guise of so-called “diversity, equity, and inclusion” (DEI) or “diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility” (DEIA) that can violate the civil-rights laws of this Nation….

The Federal Government is charged with enforcing our civil-rights laws. The purpose of this order is to ensure that it does so by ending illegal preferences and discrimination.

All the government needs to do is enforce existing law. That’s a point we make all the time.

The Merit-Based EO then terminates numerous prior federal affirmative action programs and bars DEI discrimination in federal contracting and grant-making. EPP has not yet challenged discriminatory federal grant requirements, which are pervasive, that was on our “to do” list, now we don’t have to do it (at least not for four more years). Given the economic largesse of the federal government, these contracting and grant-making changes are huge.

But it’s not as huge as what comes next. The Merit-Based EO takes aim at the private sector and higher education, holding the sledgehammer of loss of funding and civil rights actions by the Justice Department, requesting a report within 120 days on the worst offenders and targets for federal action (emphasis added):

Sec. 4. Encouraging the Private Sector to End Illegal DEI Discrimination and Preferences.

(a) The heads of all agencies, with the assistance of the Attorney General, shall take all appropriate action with respect to the operations of their agencies to advance in the private sector the policy of individual initiative, excellence, and hard work identified in section 2 of this order.

(b) To further inform and advise me so that my Administration may formulate appropriate and effective civil-rights policy, the Attorney General, within 120 days of this order, in consultation with the heads of relevant agencies and in coordination with the Director of OMB, shall submit a report to the Assistant to the President for Domestic Policy containing recommendations for enforcing Federal civil-rights laws and taking other appropriate measures to encourage the private sector to end illegal discrimination and preferences, including DEI. The report shall contain a proposed strategic enforcement plan identifying: (i) Key sectors of concern within each agency’s jurisdiction; (ii) The most egregious and discriminatory DEI practitioners in each sector of concern; (iii) A plan of specific steps or measures to deter DEI programs or principles (whether specifically denominated “DEI” or otherwise) that constitute illegal discrimination or preferences. As a part of this plan, each agency shall identify up to nine potential civil compliance investigations of publicly traded corporations, large non-profit corporations or associations, foundations with assets of 500 million dollars or more, State and local bar and medical associations, and institutions of higher education with endowments over 1 billion dollars; (iv) Other strategies to encourage the private sector to end illegal DEI discrimination and preferences and comply with all Federal civil-rights laws; (v) Litigation that would be potentially appropriate for Federal lawsuits, intervention, or statements of interest; and (vi) Potential regulatory action and sub-regulatory guidance.

Sec. 5. Other Actions. Within 120 days of this order, the Attorney General and the Secretary of Education shall jointly issue guidance to all State and local educational agencies that receive Federal funds, as well as all institutions of higher education that receive Federal grants or participate in the Federal student loan assistance program under Title IV of the Higher Education Act, 20 U.S.C. 1070 et seq., regarding the measures and practices required to comply with Students for Fair Admissions, Inc. v. President and Fellows of Harvard College, 600 U.S. 181 (2023).

Through our work at EPP, we have already identified numerous recalcitrant and systematically discriminatory institutions who deserve formal DOJ investigation, at minimum, and we will be making our findings public long in advance of the OMB report required by the Merit-Based EO.

It looks like the prep work started by the Trump team in November is really starting to bear fruit.

I do not post from Legal Insurrection often, but I have found them very reliable for legal questions.

Well let’s face it DEI is racism and I know people who have been subjected to the worst abuse from it.

HOORAY President Trump! DIE DEI.

They sound excellent—focusing on the details is boring but critical work.

There are many thousands of federal bureaucrats who need to be removed (plan A) or detailed to a very cold and nasty place (plan B).

DEI was just an academic hoax like Global Warming. Every decade they trot out a new theme. Global warming, Trans, Toxic Masculinity, CRT. Triggering,

I think people are tired of the fact that every stupid idea that comes into the liberal hive mind is instantly the most important thing in the world, and anyone who disagrees is some sort of archvillain

When I joined a large corporation years ago, the orientation training was done by a black woman who’s main point was white men are inherently racist.

It was offensive and racist on its face.

Then I sat in HRM meetings chaired by another black women where certain open positions were designated minority or female or both. That was illegal, but that is what goes on.

I wish this applied to NYS where workers are mandated to take a NYC course on all the various gender types, it’s harassment disguised as harassment training.

The left is just chumming the water because like Hollywood they’ve got nothing.

The rich Harvard lawyer DEI lecturer in one mandatory seminar started off by telling everybody don’t you dare say that I’m racist because I’m black I cannot possibly be racist.

Also not to tell him that he had been able to go to Harvard and become rich, because he was just lucky and America is still racist.

Yeah some Americans are racist - Him!

DEI has always been the central pillar of the Democrat Party...

Don't educate, INDOCTRINATE!

Hahahahaha! Sounds like one of those chants we can use!

DIE! DIE! DEE EEE III!

Dems be shopping for a “federal judge” who will enjoin this, you can bet on it.

We have been subjected to sixty years of anti-white hate.

That nightmare is in the process of being over.

That is why the Trump team is flooding the zone—”moving fast and breaking things”.

It makes it harder for the left to prioritize and react.

Their big government philosophy created a powerful executive branch—and while the courts can and do intervene from time to time it is the exception and not the rule.