Trump Shuts Down Federal DEI Initiatives And Put Staffers On Leave
by Siladitya Ray · ForbesTopline
President Donald Trump’s administration issued a directive late on Tuesday ordering all federal diversity, equity and inclusion offices to be shut down by Wednesday evening and putting all staffers overseeing the initiatives to be put on paid leave, following through on the president's vow to crack down on the programs he claims are discriminatory.
Key Facts
A memo sent by the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) to all federal agencies offered guidance on enacting Trump’s executive order to dismantle federal diversity efforts.
It directs the heads of federal agencies and departments to place all staffers overseeing DEI efforts on administrative paid leave by 5 p.m. on Wednesday and lay out plans for staff reductions by Jan. 31.
The agencies and departments have also been ordered to take down any websites and social media accounts by the Wednesday evening deadline.
The memo also orders the immediate withdrawal of any “pending documents, directives, orders, materials, and equity plans” regarding DEI in the federal workforce and the cancellation of related training initiatives.
By Thursday, the federal agencies will be required to share a complete list of all diversity-related offices and employees who were staffed in those offices as of Election Day (November 5) and all DEI-related agency contracts.
The memo also orders the agencies to share a list of all “contract descriptions or personnel position descriptions” that were changed since election day to “obscure their connection to DEIA programs.”
What Are The Agency Staffers Being Told?
Agency heads will need to send a notice informing all employees in the agency about the changes. The OPM has provided a template for wording the notice, which informs all employees about the move to close “all agency DEIA offices and end all DEIA-related contracts.” The notice adds that: “These programs divided Americans by race, wasted taxpayer dollars, and resulted in shameful discrimination.” The staffers will also be informed that the Trump administration is “aware of efforts by some in government to disguise these programs by using coded or imprecise language,” and urged to report this within 10 days. The notice ends by saying there will be no repercussions “for timely reporting this information,” but warns that not doing so could “result in adverse consequences.”
Key Background
Shortly after taking office on Monday, Trump signed a flurry of executive orders, among them one titled “Ending Radical and Wasteful Government DEI Programs and Preferencing.” The order called for the elimination of federal diversity, equity and inclusion programs, calling them “illegal and immoral discrimination programs.” The order also attacked the “infiltration” of the federal government with DEI programs and directed federal agencies to stop considering diversity during its hiring process. The president and his allies have attacked DEI programs, claiming they are discriminatory and in his inaugural speech, Trump said he would end “the government policy of trying to socially engineer race and gender into every aspect of public and private life.”