Donald Trump quickly made good on his pledge to sever diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) policies in the federal government as he is set to fire all DEI hires by tomorrow.
The new Trump administration sent a letter to all heads and acting heads of government agencies on Tuesday, informing them all federal employees in DEI roles must be placed on paid leave by 5pm Wednesday.
All DEI offices in federal agencies are also being shuttered in the move, which comes after Trump signed an anti-DEI executive order in front of a cheering crowd at his inauguration on Monday.
In a letter first obtained by CBS News, the agencies were ordered to ‘take prompt actions’ against all departments ‘focusing exclusively on DEI initiatives and programs.’
The letter also demands all public DEI focused webpages be taken offline, and orders employees within the departments to report ‘any efforts to disguise these programs by using coded or imprecise language.’
Any employees that are aware of ‘coded or imprecise language’ intended to keep DEI programs alive but do not report them within 10 days are warned of ‘adverse consequences.’
Trump’s executive order, titled ‘Ending Radical and Wasteful Government DEI Programs and Preferencing and Initial Rescissions of Harmful Executive Orders and Actions’, directly reverses a DEI executive order enacted by President Biden on his first day in office four years ago.
Tuesday’s order concludes: ‘These programs divided Americans by race, wasted taxpayer dollars, and resulted in shameful discrimination.’
After all DEI hires are placed on leave by 5pm Wednesday, agencies are ordered to develop plans to lay off each employee that was hired under DEI policies, with a deadline of next Friday given to develop a list for a ‘reduction in force action.’
Agencies must then report to the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) on ‘all steps taken’ to remove DEI programs by January 23, including a complete list of all employees that had been in DEI offices as of November 5, 2024.
A written plan for firing all DEI employees must then be submitted to the OPM by January 31, 2025, including a list of all ‘contract descriptions or personnel position descriptions that were changed since November 5, 2024’ to conceal their DEI intentions.
The executive order slammed the ‘infiltration’ of DEI programs into the federal government, and cited the executive order signed by Biden on the first day of his presidency that aimed to tackle racial inequalities in government.
Another similar executive order signed by Trump on Tuesday also rolled back affirmative action in federal contracting, reversing a longstanding order first signed by President Lyndon Johnson in 1965.
Shortly after signing the anti-DEI executive order this week, Trump fired the female leader of the US Coast Guard, Admiral Linda Fagan, over concerns about her obsession with DEI policies.
In a memo issued by the White House on Tuesday night, the Trump administration claimed progress made by the passage of civil rights legislation decades ago as having been lost to DEI programs.
‘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,’ the memo read.
Trump’s order argued that DEI programs ‘not only violate the text and spirit of our longstanding Federal civil-rights laws, they also undermine our national unity.’
‘They deny, discredit, and undermine the traditional American values of hard work, excellence, and individual achievement in favor of an unlawful, corrosive, and pernicious identity-based spoils system,’ the memo continued.
‘Hardworking Americans who deserve a shot at the American Dream should not be stigmatized, demeaned, or shut out of opportunities because of their race or sex.
‘The American people have witnessed first-hand the disastrous consequences of illegal, pernicious discrimination that has prioritized how people were born instead of what they were capable of doing.’
Dismantling the federal government’s DEI programs was just one of a wave of executive orders Trump signed in his first hours back in power.
Many of the orders reversed policies his predecessor put into effect during his four years in the White House – and a number of the orders even include language hitting out at former President Biden.
The orders range in topics from national security, migration at the southern border, the use of natural resources and even gender ideology.
The very first executive action Trump signed into law was to rescind 78 Biden-era executive orders.
‘The previous administration has embedded deeply unpopular inflationary, illegal and radical practices within every agency and office of the federal government,’ Trump’s own executive action reads.
‘Orders to open the borders have endangered the American people and dissolved federal, state and local resources that should be used to benefit the American people. Climate extremism has exploded inflation and overburdened businesses with regulation.
‘To commence the policies that will make our Nation united, fair, safe and prosperous again, it is the policy of the United States to restore common sense to the federal government.’
Among the executive actions he rescinded were some Biden signed rescinding his own executive actions from his previous administration, and a number dealing with migration-related issues.
One such action was Biden’s order Enabling All Qualified Americans to Serve Their Country in Uniform, which said gender identity is not a bar from service.
Trump also rescinded policies establishing a White House Gender Policy Council and ending Cuba’s designation as a state sponsor of Terrorism.
The ‘Initial rescissions of harmful executive orders and actions’ memo included a reversal on sanctions against the International Criminal Court.
Other executive orders pledged to restore free speech and end censorship, to end the ‘weaponization’ of the federal government against ‘political opponents’, and ordering the return of all federal employees to in-person work.