Trump Executive Order Puts Ban On ‘Un-American’ Corporate Diversity Training

President Donald Trump announced an executive order that bans “divisive” and “un-American” diversity training that addresses gender and race inequalities in the workplace. Many new training systems have developed this year since the death in police custody of George Floyd in May.

“The biggest challenge right now is the confusion, chaos, and uncertainty of not knowing what this (order) means,” said attorney and diversity expert M.E. Hart, who helps business and federal agencies with diversity training for employees. “My concern is that it will stop these efforts for months and may have a ceiling effect on the momentum in businesses and organizations,” most likely to the recent efforts of corporations to pursue better diversity training this year.

Corporations in various industries around the country are reviewing their training tactics after hearing Trump’s order. The executive order would eliminate government contracts with businesses that do not comply, a major problem for businesses like defense contractors, where the government is their largest client. There are also several companies and industry groups supporting those lobbying against the executive order.

The executive order, titled the “Executive Order on Combating Race and Sex Stereotyping,” states that any training that is “rooted in the pernicious and false belief that America is an irredeemably racist and sexist country,” is unlawful. Corporations are asked to discontinue training “that inculcates in its employees any form of race or sex stereotyping or any form of race or sex scapegoating,” threatening the dissolving of their contracts with the government if they fail to do so.

The executive order references a recent training at the Treasury Department that stated “all White people, regardless of how ‘woke’ they are, contribute to racism,” which follows the statements made from Discover Institute researcher Christopher F. Rufo on Tucker Carlson‘s show on Fox News. Rufo was ecstatic to hear that Trump issued the order, stating he had persuaded “the President of the United States to abolish critical race theory…(and) used all of the mechanisms of power to destroy the anti-American ideology of critical race theory,” on Facebook last Tuesday.

Article by Mia Graham