During the early days of the second presidency of Donald Trump, federal policies regarding diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI), in addition to sometimes accessibility (DEIA), have undergone significant change. Trump attributed societal problems to diversity, equity, and inclusion and wokeness. Equating diversity with incompetence, he reversed pro-diversity policies in the federal government, and downsized divisions working on civil rights. He reoriented remaining civil rights divisions to target state and local officials, companies, and colleges for "illegal DEI", which became a buzzword in his administration. His administration launched worldwide investigations into companies, cities, and institutions for alleged "DEI" programs. The moves came following his 2024 presidential campaign which stated it would reinterpret existing Civil Rights-era protections for minorities to counter "anti-white racism". Trump promised to roll back Biden-era Executive Orders on diversity and racial equity, saying there was a "definite anti-white feeling in the country".

In response to anti-DEI executive actions and against what the administration called "improper ideology", numerous agencies and websites altered or removed material related to women, racial minorities, and transgender individuals.

Public statements

At a press conference held in January 2025, the day after a mid-air collision between an airplane and helicopter that killed 67 people, the worst aviation accident in the U.S. since 2001, Trump read from a January 2024 New York Post article that falsely said "the FAA is actively recruiting workers who suffer severe intellectual disabilities, psychiatric problems and other mental and physical conditions under a diversity and inclusion hiring initiative spelled out on the agency's website."

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Government purge

On January 20-21, 2025, Trump signed several executive orders targeting DEI efforts:

Executive Order 14148, "Initial Rescissions of Harmful Executive Orders and Actions" Executive Order 14151, "Ending Radical and Wasteful Government DEI Programs and Preferencing" Executive Order 14168, "Defending Women from Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government" Executive Order 14173, "Ending Illegal Discrimination and Restoring Merit-Based Opportunity", rescinding the 1965 Executive Order 11246

The orders demanded that all governmental DEI programs be shut down by January 23, and placed employees on administrative leave and eventual layoff.

An internal Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) report obtained by the Washington Post outlined a three-phase process by which DOGE would lead a purge of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) from the federal government:

In phase one, which took place on January 20, 2025, all DEI related executive orders and initiatives would be rescinded, offices at various federal organizations that served a DEI role would be dissolved, and their employees terminated, federal websites would remove all DEI-related material from their websites, and DEI-related contracts would be terminated. In phase two, which lasted from January 21 to February 19, the government would begin purging employees that did not work in a DEI-related role, but who had taken part in DEI in some way that made them "corrupted". On February 5, Axios reported that DOGE representatives were searching through the databases of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) to find employees associated with DEI initiatives. In phase three, scheduled for February 20 to July 19, the DOGE begins to commit mass-scale firings of any employee in any office or part of the federal government which did not take part in any DEI offices or initiatives, but who were nonetheless determined through unknown criteria to be "DEI-related".

In February 2025 it was reported that the Foreign Service Institute of the U.S. State Department "suspended access to thousands of pages of training materials" related to DEI, and the Internal Revenue Service "deleted any mention of the words 'diversity', 'equity' and 'inclusion' from its procedural handbook, including from anodyne passages on taxes and finance." It was also reported that career civil servants in the United States Department of Agriculture who had previously worked to implement policies intended to reduce racial, sexual-orientation, and gender-identity discrimination were "placed on leave and faced potential firing." It was also reported that the acting director of the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) told the heads of agencies that any staff members working on DEI programs before November 5, 2024 (election day) should be targeted for termination, and the OPM encouraged workers to "report colleagues who were continuing to do DEIA-related work."

Women, people of color, and LGBTQ individuals have been scrubbed from federal websites, image archives, and physical installations:

The National Park Service removed mentions of transgender individuals from its website on the Stonewall riots, changed "LGBT" to "LGB", and removed the word "queer". The National Cryptologic Museum papered over portraits of women and racial minorities in their Hall of Honor, including those of Elizebeth Friedman, Washington Wong, and Ralph W. Adams Jr. The portraits were restored after news of the actions began circulating online. Pictures that celebrated women in science were removed from NASA buildings. The Air Force removed videos of the Tuskegee Airmen and Women Airforce Service Pilots. The Defense Intelligence Agency paused its observances of several holidays and commemoratory months, including Martin Luther King Jr. Day, Pride Month, and Holocaust Days of Remembrance. In March 2025, over 26,000 images were slated to be purged from military websites, including those of decorated veterans and the Enola Gay, which was erroneously flagged because its name contains the word "gay". A web page about Charles Calvin Rogers, a Black Medal of Honor recipient of the Vietnam War, was briefly deleted and had "medal" replaced with "deimedal" in its URL. An article about Jackie Robinson's experience in the military was similarly deleted and had "dei" added to its URL before being restored.

Department of Defense

The purge resulted in the accidental deletion of various unrelated data, such as references to the Enola Gay and operational data held on NSA servers.

Reactions According to two veteran Republican budget experts, the first phase of DOGE's plan "appears driven more by an ideological assault on federal agencies long hated by conservatives than a good-faith effort to save taxpayer dollars".

According to Brenda Sue Fulton, "[this] administration has hung a sign outside the armed forces saying if you're not a white male, you are no longer welcome."

Some experts have suggested that some efforts to protect diversity, equity and inclusion "will continue - but in a different guise, one more suited to the political mood of a country that has just elected a president who has pledged a war on 'woke'".

Early February 2025, a lawsuit was filed against Trump's executive orders, arguing that they were unconstitutional. In March, the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit paused the lower court's nationwide preliminary injunction and permitted the enforcement of the executive orders pending the outcome of the appeal.

In June 2025, Reagan-appointed Judge William G. Young declared Trump's reasoning in cutting "DEI" and "gender ideology extremism" programs for the National Institutes of Health "void and illegal", stating that claims of fighting DEI were "appalling" and "palpably clear" racial discrimination, and that "I've never seen a record where racial discrimination was so palpable. I've sat on this bench now for 40 years. I've never seen government racial discrimination like this".

Roy Campbell, an auxiliary bishop of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Washington, wrote in a reflection published September 2025, stated "“This administration wants to erase Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion from the American conscience ... However, just think about the letters, DEI. DEI, Dei means God in Latin.”

In December 2025, ProPublica reported that after the signing of EO 14151, more than 1000 nonprofits rewrote the mission statements in their tax filings to remove references to DEI efforts.

Actions

The administration has: Cut funding for about 1,200 grants focused on heart disease, HIV/AIDS, Alzheimer’s disease, alcohol and substance abuse and mental health issues Cut funding to programs for students with hearing and vision loss Cut funding to research grants for students who are first-generation, poor, have been in foster care, have a disability or are from a rural area Cut research into health disparities Put roughly $18 billion in funding for New York City infrastructure projects on hold Reduced certain words Scaled back enforcement of fair housing Shut Defense Department Advisory Committee on Women in the Services and according to a tweet, ended the Women Peace and Security program Targeted hundreds of grants that focused on the health of Black communities, women and LGBTQ people Threatened to cut funding to public schools

See also 2025 United States government online resource removals

References