Texas Republican Gov. Greg Abbott’s office sent letters to state universities and agencies asserting that Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) initiatives, tests and programs are illegal as a condition for hiring.
"When a state agency spends taxpayer dollars to fund offices, departments or employee positions dedicated to promoting forbidden DEI initiatives, such actions are also inconsistent with the law,” wrote Gardner Pate, who is Abbott’s chief of staff.
The letter says that it is against federal and state laws to discriminate “against a current or prospective employee because of that person’s race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, disability or military service.” He added that employees of state agencies are subject to those protections, and this amounts to “hundreds of thousands” of people.
While the letter celebrates the diversity of Texas, it also draws a distinction between diversity and DEI programs. The letter says DEI programs have been “manipulated to push policies that expressly favor some demographic groups to the detriment of others,” and in practice, further discrimination reduces rather than increases diversity.
In a recent piece by the Austin Journal, fellows at the Manhattan Institute, Ilya Shapiro and Christopher Rufo, say that state legislators should propose legislation to eliminate DEI offices. They also proposed a set of four directives that serve as “model legislation,” which includes banning DEI-related offices and programs, trainings, DEI statements used in hiring and putting an end to racial preferences.
PBS reported that Florida Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis has also opposed DEI. On Dec. 28, he sent a letter to the Florida Department of Education requesting information regarding the “expenditure of state resources on programs and initiatives related to diversity, equity and inclusion, and critical race theory.” The letter requested the schools in the state university system to report and submit information, including costs, to the governor’s office.
According to a Feb. 8 Austin Journal report, news of Abbott’s letter comes at a time when Texas Tech University was criticized for its DEI program. According to Austin Journal, John Sailer, a fellow at the National Association of Scholars, discovered and published documents that show the biology department at the university evaluated diversity statements and used a DEI committee when screening potential faculty and staff candidates.
“Requiring faculty to catalog their commitment to those views necessarily blackballs anybody who dissents from an orthodoxy that has nothing to do with scientific competence,” Sailer said in the Austin Journal report.
