The definitions in our glossary are primarily sourced from Nolo’s Plain-English Law Dictionary and Cornell Law School’s Legal Information Institute. We have made slight modifications where needed for brevity and to better tailor the definitions to the specific needs of users of this website. For more detailed explanations of the terms, users are encouraged to review the definitions on these websites or conduct their own independent research.
Explainer
Trump's Early Actions on DEI
Advancing DEI Initiative
President Trump has already taken several actions with respect to DEI:
Rescinded DEI-related executive orders issued by President Biden, including the Biden order that rescinded Trump’s 2020 ban on “divisive” DEI training by federal contractors.
Appointed Andrea Lucas as Acting Chair of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), who has announced she will prioritize “rooting out unlawful DEI-motivated race and sex discrimination.”
Issued three other executive orders targeting: (a) “illegal discrimination”; (b) government DEI programs; and (c) “gender ideology.”
This Explainer summarizes key items in each of the three principal DEI executive orders, followed by implications for private-sector organizations.
Executive Order on “Ending Illegal Discrimination and Restoring Merit-Based Opportunity”
This order:
Revokes various DEI-related executive orders, including Executive Order 11246, which required equal opportunity and nondiscrimination in government contracting.
Instructs the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs to cease promoting diversity and cease holding contractors responsible for taking “affirmative action.”
Requires every government contract or grant award to include a term requiring the recipient to “certify that it does not operate any programs promoting DEI that violate any applicable Federal anti-discrimination laws.”
Instructs the Attorney General to submit recommendations on how to “encourage the private sector to end illegal discrimination and preferences, including DEI,” such as through civil compliance investigations and litigation.
Executive Order on “Ending Radical and Wasteful Government DEI Programs and Preferencing”
This order:
Requires federal agencies to terminate all DEI positions, equity action plans, and DEI performance requirements for employees, contractors, and grantees.
Instructs agencies to provide the Director of the Office of Management and Budget with a list of federal contractors who have provided DEI training or DEI materials to agency or department employees.
Provides that federal employment practices, including performance reviews, will not consider DEI factors, goals, policies, mandates, or requirements.
Executive Order on “Defending Women from Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government”
This order:
Provides that the policy of the United States is to recognize two unchangeable sexes (male and female) grounded in “fundamental and incontrovertible reality.”
Instructs agencies to enforce laws with sex-based rights, protections, opportunities, and accommodations using the biological definitions in the order.
Requires government ID such as passports and visas to “accurately reflect the holder’s sex,” and requires agency forms to list “male or female” rather than gender identity.
Instructs the Attorney General to “issue guidance to ensure the freedom to express the binary nature of sex and the right to single-sex spaces in workplaces,” and instructs agencies to prioritize enforcement of such rights and freedoms.
Instructs the head of the EEOC to rescind the agency’s “Enforcement Guidance on Harassment in the Workplace.”
Key Takeaways for Private Organizations
The early actions of the Trump administration signal what we have warned in other writings—that this administration will use executive orders and agency enforcement action (among other strategies) to “wage a multi-pronged assault on DEI.” Organizations that have not already conducted a thorough self-audit of their DEI programs with legal counsel should do so.
These executive orders do not require private employers—even those that contract with the federal government—to abandon or alter their own DEI programs.
Organizations that allow workers to align pronouns and other identity markers to their gender identity, or that allow workers to use bathrooms that align with their gender identity, may continue to do so.
These executive orders are limited in scope. They do not implement the entire Project 2025 agenda with respect to DEI, nor do they bring the “Dismantle DEI Act” into effect.
Even with the revocation of Executive Order 11246 regarding equal opportunity in federal contracting, federal contractors are still required to comply with applicable federal anti-discrimination laws, such as Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (which prohibits employment discrimination on the basis of race, color, national origin, religion, and sex—including sexual orientation and gender identity), and section 1981 (which prohibits race discrimination in contracting).