Trump’s efforts to dismantle federal DEI programs are off to an aggressive start

The Trump administration has ordered federal agencies to place all employees in diversity, equity and inclusion roles on administrative leave by Wednesday evening, and to come up with a plan to lay them off by the end of the month.

The memorandum, issued by the Office of Personnel Management on Tuesday, is a part of President Donald Trump’s aggressive reversal of the federal DEI policies of his predecessor.

Federal agencies have until 5 p.m. ET on Wednesday to place DEI employees on paid leave and remove all public web pages of DEI offices. Agencies have until Jan. 31 to submit a plan for a “reduction-in-force” of those employees.

The memo also orders all DEI-related training and contracts to be scrapped and encourages employees to file a report if they suspect that any such program has been “disguised” under different terminology or face “adverse consequences.”

It’s unclear how many people in the federal workforce will be affected by these cuts. The White House, meanwhile, has characterized the crackdown on DEI programs as a “win for Americans.”

“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 Tuesday night.

Trump had vowed to dismantle DEI programs across the federal government on the campaign trail, and he signed an executive order to shut down all federal DEI offices and initiatives on his first day back in office, calling them “illegal and immoral discrimination programs.”

In recent years, Republicans have aimed their ire at DEI programs as part of an anti-“woke” crusade, claiming that such initiatives foster discrimination and are racially divisive. Some have also wielded it as an attack against prominent people of color, like the “DEI hire” accusations leveled against Vice President Kamala Harris during the election. Advocates, however, have said that DEI programs, despite their flaws, are a tool to advance equality in schools and in workplaces, and that they help recruit and retain talent outside of traditional channels.