Trump goes to war with the education mafia

Following his inaugural ceremony on Jan. 20, President Trump kept a campaign pledge when he signed the death knell for the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) programs in the federal government, signaling an end to discriminatory hiring and programs and a return to meritocracy. He rescinded the Biden order that, along with follow-on orders, implemented DEI not only in the Department of Education, but in other federal agencies including the workforce, medical, energy, finance, legal, housing, military, transportation, national security and Social Security.

On Jan. 21 Trump signed an executive order to end the federal money tree for schools and colleges that have DEI programs or contractors who engage in the practices. Schools receiving federal money for special education programs and low-income student populations in K-12 schools or federal student loan programs (Pell grants) in colleges and universities will be issued guidance for compliance with the mandate.

For years K-12 public education has prioritized identity politics over academic learning. Now we have proof of the depth of complicity of the U.S. Department of Education in the discrimination and racism dominating classrooms.

An investigative study by Parents Defending Education exposed how Biden’s Department of Education shelled out more than $1 billion on various DEI initiatives since 2021. Poring through public data for details of grants from the Education Department, researchers found $490 million was spent on DEI hiring efforts, $343 million on DEI programming and $170 million on DEI-related mental health.

None of this funding has gone toward academic learning; instead, it has entrenched a radical left ideology in public education. The result is a continued downward spiral of academic achievement in K-12.

With Trump’s order shutting off the spigot to federal dollars funding harmful DEI programs, should we dare to hope that these taxpayer dollars will be redirected toward academic learning – or better still, returned to the states where they constitutionally belong?

The order also specifically revokes the 1965 Executive Order 11246, “Equal Opportunity,” from the Johnson administration. Rather than promoting equal opportunity, the order implemented “affirmative action” with a system of quotas for non-whites and women and preferences for identity over merit.

Harvard, through affirmative action, has denied some of the brightest minds in the land an entrance into its hallowed halls because they had white skin.

Discrimination has replaced talent and merit at Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology in Fairfax County, Virginia. Once the top-ranked public high school in the nation, the student body was comprised of about 72% Asian, 20% white, 3% Hispanic, 1% black and 4% other, in a county that was 20% Asian-American. The admissions process relied on a student’s performance on standardized tests, grade-point average, writing samples and teacher recommendations. That changed in 2020 with the downgrading of the admissions policy: Testing requirements were eliminated, GPA requirements were lowered, and applicants are to be English language learners and eligible for free or reduced price lunches. Now the student body is 54% Asian, 22% white, 11% Hispanic, 7% black and 6% other, with the county comprised of 20.3% Asians. Today the school has fallen to 14th place in the latest U.S. News rankings.

Not only does DEI target meritocracy, but is intolerant of free speech. Guest speakers at college campus events have had their lives endangered by mobs enraged over their political views.

MIT canceled a lecture scheduled for October 2021 by Dr. Dorian Abbot, a geophysicist at the University of Chicago. His lecture was non-political – the “climates of extrasolar planets,” but the student activists didn’t like his political views. He had criticized diversity, equity and inclusion and objected to affirmative action of race over merit. Radical student activists forced the MIT administration to cancel the lecture.

At the University of North Texas at Denton, Kelly Neidert, a graduate student and former president of Young Conservatives of Texas, invited anti-trans political candidate Jeff Younger to speak to the organization. Angry protesters shouted expletives and threats at her and Younger. With the Antifa mob roaming the halls looking for her, the police had to hide Neidert in a dark janitor’s closet while they escorted Younger from the building.

Already more than a third of the large K-12 school districts in the U.S. have DEI departments or mention the terms in their mission statements. Here in Texas, Dallas, Houston, San Antonio and Austin school districts all have equity programs or initiatives. KIPP, the largest charter chain in the U.S., which also has schools in Texas, is deeply steeped in DEI, as well as Common Core and Critical Race Theory. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott has announced that the legislature, currently in session, will pass a bill to ban DEI in K-12.

Training K-12 school districts to shut down free speech has been quite lucrative for universities. Pennsylvania school districts have paid thousands of dollars in membership dues to the University of Pennsylvania’s Graduate School of Education to teach administrators how to identify microaggressions and stand up for others when one is spotted. Superintendents are taught to assess their own compliance and that of others with anti-racist practice. This will of, course, earn social score credits.

DEI is deeply entrenched in higher education, with many six-figure staffers cashing in on the bonanza. With the passage of a ban on DEI in 2023, the University of Texas System freed up $25 million by closing 21 offices and eliminating 311 full- and part-time positions and canceling 681 trainings related to DEI. At the University of Texas at Austin, more than $13 million has been spent on DEI salaries for nearly 200 jobs.

With nearly all college deans dedicated to DEI, it is not surprising that DEI is intricately enmeshed into college courses, programs and staffing. This makes it next to impossible to track the amount of public funding that supports the left-wing political ideology.

Even state bans on DEI have failed to shut down DEI as supporters do stealth end runs around them. As with Common Core, there is rebranding, and websites are revised with vague language. Since the Texas law went into effect, the radical ideology has continued to seep into the state’s public universities. Texas A&M attempted to sponsor a DEI conference that barred white and Asian students. Only with Gov. Abbott’s threat to fire the university president did the university back down.

The possible loss of federal funds will be highly effective in getting DEI programs abolished on a broad scale. But we can count on the survival of DEI, like the hardy wild onions in our yards, unless we become highly aggressive watchdogs. President Trump needs all of us to help stop this cultural revolution that threatens the survival of a free America.