As Ford took steps last week to distance itself from the diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) movement that has swept the corporate world in recent years, it became just one of a number of companies that are rethinking their commitments to race-based ideology.

In an Aug. 28 memo to employees, Ford CEO Jim Farley said he is “mindful that [Ford’s] employees and customers hold a wide range of beliefs,” and that the company is taking “a fresh look” at its DEI program.

Ford’s reversal on DEI follows that of other major corporations, including Tractor Supply, John Deere, Harley-Davidson, Polaris, Indian Motorcycle, Lowe’s, and most recently Molson Coors, which have reportedly revised their DEI policies because of either public pressure or legal challenges.

In addition, 25 companies have been formally notified by shareholders since 2021 that their DEI programs constitute illegal discrimination under federal and state civil rights laws, as well as a breach of fiduciary duty to investors.

“This is a trend, for sure,” Jerry Bowyer, president of Bowyer Research, a conservative investment consulting firm, told The Epoch Times. “The rapid succession, the way it’s occurred, there’s almost a cascade effect going on.

“That whole world of ESG, stakeholder capitalism, DEI—the whole idea of companies as social engineers rather than as value producing business—had just gotten so far ahead of what customers wanted. Shareholders were not asking for this.”

According to conservative activist Robby Starbuck, who has been posting on social media regarding his investigation of “woke” policies at numerous companies, Ford confirmed to him that it would end its participation in a number of DEI-related efforts.

“One by one we WILL bring sanity back to corporate America,” Starbuck stated.

In response to a request by The Epoch Times for comment, a Ford spokesperson stated: “The communication to our global employees speaks for itself. We have nothing further to add.”

Starbuck’s postings went viral when they were supported by people such as SpaceX and Tesla founder Elon Musk, who stated on social media platform X, which he owns: “DEI is just another word for racism. Shame on anyone who uses it.”

Taking on Customer Feedback

A number of companies that pursued DEI and other progressive programs have come under pressure from activists, shareholders, customers, and state attorneys general to end them.

Responding to consumer backlash, Tractor Supply issued a statement in June that said: “We have heard from customers that we have disappointed them. We have taken this feedback to heart.”

The company stated that it would no longer participate in the Human Rights Campaign rating system but instead “focus on rural America priorities including ag education, animal welfare, veteran causes and being a good neighbor, and stop sponsoring nonbusiness activities like pride festivals and voting campaigns.”

It further pledged to eliminate DEI roles within the company and drop CO2 emission goals, focusing instead on land and water conservation.

Law firms are also stepping back from DEI programs. Legal suits by conservative nonprofit American Alliance for Equal Rights (AAER) have compelled some major law firms to allow people of all races to apply for fellowships previously reserved for people of color.

“Using someone’s race as a factor in employment decisions is unfair, polarizing, and illegal,” Edward Blum, president of AAER, told The Epoch Times.

“Significant majorities of Americans of all races do not believe someone’s race should be used by any employer to hire or promote any individual. Corporations are at risk of being sued for their DEI practices.”

On the other side, organizations that support DEI policies have had harsh words for companies that backtrack.

“Harley-Davidson’s choice to back away from the Corporate Equality Index is an impulsive decision,” Human Rights Campaign Vice President Eric Bloem said in a statement on Aug. 20.

The group introduced the Corporate Equality Index as a social credit rating system for corporations.

Bloem said that activists who are pushing against DEI “believe they can bully their way into dismantling initiatives that help everyone thrive in the workplace.”

Bloem said that with the LGBT people “wielding $1.4 trillion in spending power, retreating from these principles undermines both consumer trust and employee success.”

Advocates of DEI programs say that they are legal and beneficial.

“The purpose of DEI and other remedial workplace programs is to improve the process by which employment decisions are made and close the gap in opportunities among workers,” Ming-Qi Chu, deputy director of the American Civil Liberties Union’s Women’s Rights Project, said in a statement.

“They do not disadvantage any particular worker. This is why they have long been held lawful.”

And many companies, such as Microsoft, have reiterated their commitment to DEI programs.

“Our focus on diversity and inclusion is unwavering,” Microsoft spokesperson Jeff Jones stated in July, disputing news reports that Microsoft had fired its entire DEI staff.

‘Eliminating All of It’

Some experts say that companies are assuming legal risks by setting corporate policy according to gender or race.

“Two recent rulings from the U.S. Supreme Court cast serious doubt on the legality of racial or gender-based quotas in employment,” Jeremy Tedesco, senior vice president of Corporate Engagement for the Alliance Defending Freedom, told The Epoch Times.

In the 2022 case of Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard, the court ruled that any universities that receive government funding could not discriminate in their admissions criteria.

“Eliminating racial discrimination means eliminating all of it,” the court stated in its majority opinion.

This was a reversal of prior court decisions, which ruled that racial discrimination at universities was permissible, provided that it was carried out as a remedy and for a limited time.

“Many companies were relying on the Supreme Court jurisprudence allowing racial bias in university admissions to justify their flagrant violations of labor law prohibitions on race and sex-based discrimination,” Will Hild, executive director of Consumers’ Research, told The Epoch Times.

“This reasoning was always dubious, but now that SCOTUS has made clear that discrimination in university admissions is illegal, they no longer even have the fantasy that their actions are legal.”

Subsequent court decisions clarified that the Harvard decision, which applied to school admissions under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act, also applied to employers under Title VII of the Act.

“In 2024, in Muldrow v. City of St. Louis, the Supreme Court clarified that Title VII protects against many different kinds of discrimination in the workplace, not just hiring and firing,” Tedesco stated.

In an April interview with law firm Jackson Lewis, U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission Commissioner Andrea Lucas stated that under Title VII there is no such thing as permissible “reverse” race or sex discrimination.

“There’s just discrimination,” Lucas, who is tasked with educating employers on federal employment law, said.

“Employers in general are not permitted to take any employment actions motivated by race or sex.”

She urged employers to have their legal counsel review “every single piece of diversity work product.”

In July 2023, attorneys general from 13 states issued a letter to the CEOs of Fortune 100 companies to remind them of their “obligations as [employers] under federal and state law to refrain from discriminating on the basis of race, whether under the label of ‘diversity, equity, and inclusion’ or otherwise.”

Signers were from Kansas, Tennessee, Alabama, Arkansas, Indiana, Nebraska, Iowa, South Carolina, Kentucky, West Virginia, Mississippi, Missouri, and Montana.

“Treating people differently because of the color of their skin, even for benign purposes, is unlawful and wrong,” the attorneys general stated. “Companies that engage in racial discrimination should and will face serious legal consequences.”

The letter cited numerous cases in federal and state courts that ruled that race-based quotas and preferences are illegal.

Studies Questioned

“Companies need to rethink their embrace of DEI,” Tedesco stated. “As legal requirements raise the cost and risk of DEI, recent academic work has shown that there is little if any benefit to the practice.”

A series of studies put out by McKinsey, a management consultancy, say that companies that have higher percentages of women or people of various skin colors perform better than those who have a higher percentage of a single gender or race. These studies were titled “Why Diversity Matters” (2015), “Delivering Through Diversity” (2018), and “Diversity Wins” (2020).

The latest of studies, titled “Diversity Matters Even More,” says: “Companies with representation of women exceeding 30 percent (and thus in the top quartile) are significantly more likely to financially outperform those with 30 percent or fewer. Similarly, companies in our top quartile for ethnic diversity show an average 27 percent financial advantage over others.”

These studies have been cited not only by private companies but also by the U.S. government, including the Department of Defense, to justify instituting race-based and gender-based hiring and promotion programs.

However, a study published in March by Econ Journal Watch, authored by accounting professors Jeremiah Green at Texas A&M and John Hand at the University of North Carolina, examined the methodology used in the McKinsey studies and concluded that the reports were “erroneous” and “should not be relied on to support the view that U.S. publicly traded firms can expect to deliver improved financial performance if they increase the racial/ethnic diversity of their executives.”

Based on the performance of companies in the S&P 500 index, Hand and Green found no statistically significant relationship between companies’ racial diversity and their sales, profits, or equity performance.

Outside of the private sector, the Biden administration has been actively implementing DEI programs for government employees.

Upon taking office, President Joe Biden issued a series of executive orders mandating that “as the Nation’s largest employer, the Federal Government must be a model for diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility, where all employees are treated with dignity and respect.”

“A growing body of evidence demonstrates that diverse, equitable, inclusive, and accessible workplaces yield higher-performing organizations,” a White House memorandum stated.

This effort, too, has sparked opposition.

In June, Republican vice presidential candidate Sen. JD Vance (R-Ohio) introduced the Dismantle DEI Act, which would eliminate all DEI programs for federal employees.

“The DEI agenda is a destructive ideology that breeds hatred and racial division,” Vance stated. “It has no place in our federal government or anywhere else in our society.”

The Epoch Times reached out to John Deere, Harley-Davidson, Polaris, Indian Motorcycle, Molson Coors, and Lowe’s for comment, but did not receive responses by publication time.