Trump Puts Gov't DEI Staff on Paid Leave, Signals End to DEI Programs
President Trump has issued a directive that put federal employees working on diversity, equity, and inclusion programs (DEI) on administrative leave Wednesday, according to a new memo from the Office of Personnel Management.
The memo outlined to the departments and agency heads that they had until 5 p.m. Wednesday to inform employees that they would be placed on administrative leave as the agencies prepare to close all DEI-related offices and programs and to remove all websites and social media accounts for such offices.
They were also directed to submit a written plan of how they will dismiss employees by Jan. 31.
Trump signed the "Ending Radical and Wasteful Government DEI Programs and Preferencing" executive order Monday which stated, "Americans deserve a government committed to serving every person with equal dignity and respect, and to expending precious taxpayer resources only on making America great."
"President Trump campaigned on ending the scourge of DEI from our federal government and returning America to a merit-based society where people are hired based on their skills, not for the color of their skin," White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a statement. "This is another win for Americans of all races, religions, and creeds. Promises made, promises kept."
It is unclear how many employees would be affected by the erasure of the program.
DEI programs took off after Joe Biden signed executive actions. However, the move came under swift criticism when some blamed the DEI agenda for promoting incompetent employees solely because of their race or sexual orientation.
Pressure to implement DEI ideology affected the private sector as well. A commercial pilot pointed out that a former flight attendant who had been fired, then rehired by United was enrolled in the airline's DEI Pilot Training program despite being on a company "Do Not Rehire" list.
The pilot failed multiple simulator training sessions and scored poorly on training exams, but was promoted.
The Carolina Journal report cites a Duke University Medical School's surgical resident who admitted the school was "abandoning...all sort(s) of metrics" in hiring surgeons to implement DEI practice.
"DEI in medicine puts innocent lives at risk," said NC Congressman Dan Bishop in response to the comment.
Trump's executive order encourages federal workers to "reward individual initiative" rather than "DEI-related factors."
"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," Trump said during his inaugural speech.
