The Coming Fight to Abolish DEI

{snip}

While the officials in Trump world are all committed to abolishing DEI in theory, they have yet to settle on a practical approach for doing so. With this in mind, I’m writing this open letter to Trump’s incoming Cabinet, outlining how to shut down DEI and win the fight for public opinion.

The first step is to understand how DEI bureaucracies became embedded in the federal government. That is the result of actions by two presidents: Barack Obama, who issued Executive Order 13583, which laid the groundwork for many national “diversity” initiatives; and Joseph Biden, who signed Executive Orders 13985 and 14035, which entrenched DEI principles into every federal department and routed billions of dollars toward advancing this ideology throughout American society.

Having understood this history, Cabinet officials must work with President Trump to rescind President Obama and President Biden’s executive orders. In their place, the 47th president should sign an order advancing the principle of colorblind equality, stating that the government shall treat all individuals equally according to their merit, rather than unequally according to their ancestry.

The second task is the work of administration. It’s one thing to issue an executive order, and another to make it a reality across the sprawling federal bureaucracy.

On this score, my primary guidance for Trump’s Cabinet is swiftly to shut down all DEI programs and to terminate the employment of all policy officials responsible for those programs, effective immediately. {snip}

{snip}

The third step is to win the fight in the press. Here again, our policy at the New College of Florida is instructive. Progressive media outlets tried to turn our elimination of DEI into a negative news cycle, but we outwitted them by speed and substitution. Because we worked so quickly, we ensured that the stories about our policy were part of a single, rather than an ongoing, news cycle. We also paired our abolition of DEI with a replacement policy, which advanced the principle of colorblind equality.

{snip}

Finally, Cabinet members should take advantage of the inevitable frenzy that will surround the new administration’s various policies and personalities. Abolishing DEI, while important, will register as a secondary headline. If officials successfully abolish these diversity programs, they can move on and never have to address it again.

The principle underlying this course of action is simple: America doesn’t need a permanent DEI bureaucracy. America needs an effective administration that treats its citizens in a fair manner without regard to race. This is broadly popular, morally just, and, with this administration, achievable as a public policy for the first time in a generation.

{snip}