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Rolling Back DEI Rewards Black Americans Instead of Crippling Them

The new Trump Administration is off to a very quick start getting our nation back on track to restore freedom and opportunity for all Americans. However, this does not come without some pushback from others. Several critics have claimed that President Trump’s executive order targeting DEI — including a repeal of President Johnson’s executive order regarding federal contractors — is harmful to black Americans.

Ambassadors with our Project 21 black leadership network disagree, and argue that it is actually DEI itself that is anti-black.

Brandon Brice

Brandon Brice

Brandon Brice:

As the former head of a statewide DEI program, I can tell you that DEI is not needed to create opportunities for black and brown communities.

In fact, it often is a deterrent, as it reduces the value of merit, hard work and qualifications. It also goes directly against Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s vision for a world where people are judged based on the content of their character.

We know that diversity matters, but we should strive for real opportunity and not just equity.

Minority voters should welcome diverse perspectives and begin to select candidates based on their solutions to fix problems and not based on their political affiliation.

 

April Chapman

April Chapman

April Chapman:

The new executive order that President Trump has implemented concerning the elimination of federal DEI programs must be properly understood with truth instead of liberal lies and propaganda.

History has shown us that black Americans were circumstantially shrinking their own poverty rate and improving their own educational outcomes before Lyndon B. Johnson signed Executive Order #11246. In the 1950s, black Americans were naturally catching up and our families were intact. After the civil rights movement, black Americans began going backwards, and — as a recent Reuters article affirms — in the 60 years since LBJ’s executive order, even in conjunction with other affirmative action programs, our economic outcomes have not significantly improved. The racial gap in median income has improved only slightly since LBJ’s 1965 speech. The question that needs to be raised is: Why would we want to keep these programs going forward unless dismal or negligible results are the intended outcome?

President Trump has ended these programs because observable reality proves that after 60 years, these programs are actually crippling and not helping black Americans. These programs have convinced an entire generation that black Americans don’t have the ability to compete based on merit. President Trump is countering this liberal narrative, and his view parallels that of Booker T. Washington, who taught that free markets, hard work and the belief in one’s own ability to be the best will dictate success and will result in a more favorable economic outcome.

Rolling back these federal DEI programs will properly reward all Americans. It will demonstrate that there are no shortcuts to success, and that American exceptionalism is available to anyone willing to work hard in a merit-based system that only concerns itself with the best favorable results regardless of the ethnicity of the person producing them.

 

Horace Cooper

Horace Cooper

Project 21 Chairman Horace Cooper:

Thank you, President Trump.

It’s great to see an American leader who recognizes that all Americans — regardless of race — can compete, and furthermore that we can’t predict based on race who will succeed and who will fail.

It’s well into the 21st century, and it’s past time that we embrace MLK’s colorblind vision. His was a dream of a nation where all Americans are free to compete and fulfill their own dreams.

Finally, with the president’s action, government will stop trying to pick racial winners and losers.

 

Donna Jackson

Donna Jackson

Project 21 Director of Membership Development Donna Jackson:

President Trump’s executive order ending federal DEI initiatives is the right move for Black America.

Victimhood is rarely for the victim. Like most liberal policies, it’s a way to use minorities for political and financial gain.

DEI programs were never designed to benefit black Americans. In fact, within the DEI industry, 76% of DEI professionals are white while less than 4% are black. Equity wasn’t even practiced within the DEI profession.

Even more egregiously, DEI was used as a tool to deliberately make minority students less competitive in the marketplace. DEI was used to protect teachers’ unions that continued to fail minority students, and black DEI professionals who cried foul were intimidated and dismissed.

President Trump’s executive order will make black Americans competitive again.

 

Steven Perry

Steven Perry

Pastor Steven Perry

DEI has been a distraction in the African-American community for a very long time.

By its nature, its social construct is to tell African Americans what they cannot do and that they’re limited.

We’re taught to be socialist in a capitalist country, which automatically puts us behind.

If you care about your future and you care about your family, embrace American values. You will be better for it.

 

Linda Lee Tarver

Linda Lee Tarver

Dr. Linda Lee Tarver:

In June 2023, the U.S. Supreme Court held that “race-conscious affirmative action in college admissions is unconstitutional.” Within hours of being sworn in, President Donald J. Trump removed “affirmative action” (cloaked as DEI) from the federal government.

The protections from racial discrimination remain in the bedrock of our government and legal systems. Yet the thought of black America succeeding in a meritocracy without set-asides, quotas and racial preferences is ludicrous to woke liberal ideologues.

The election of 2024 included a mandate for merit over race in policy and in practice.

 

Priscilla Rahn

Priscilla Rahn

Priscilla Rahn:

DEI policies, while often well-intended, have led to divisive and counterproductive outcomes by prioritizing identity over merit and fairness.

Despite decades of affirmative action, the median income for black families remains 30% below the national median. While these initiatives may have provided some short-term access to jobs or educational opportunities, they haven’t fundamentally changed economic outcomes for black families over generations. Focusing on skills, education and economic policies that benefit all Americans will do more to lift black families than race-based programs.

The president’s order restores equal opportunity by ensuring that all Americans—regardless of race—compete on a level playing field, rather than being subjected to government-mandated quotas or preferential treatment.

True opportunity comes from empowering individuals based on their skills, hard work and character—not from government-imposed classifications that divide rather than unite.

 

Kevin McGary

Kevin McGary

Kevin McGary:

With President Trump’s recent proclamation, he aims to restore America as a country where the rule of law is upheld, equality is embraced, personal dignity is encouraged, and the excellence of human flourishing for all Americans is not only encouraged but expected.

As Americans, we should stand united with President Trump’s new DEI directives and applaud DEI’s ultimate and final demise.

 

 

Patrina Mosley

Patrina Mosley

Patrina Mosley:

The 45th and now 47th president just came back swinging at the leftist ideology that has infiltrated our institutions with bad ideas and bigotry. Rescinding Lyndon B. Johnson’s Executive Order 11246 has canceled affirmative action by replacing it with merit-based opportunity.

However, those same institutions enable illegal alien invasions for the gain of cheap labor — which isn’t so cheap when you factor in societal costs.



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