To defeat it, federal employees need to be catechized in American principles.
At least on paper, DEI in the federal government is dead. On the very first day of his second presidency, Donald Trump issued a presidential action, “Ending Radical And Wasteful Government DEI Programs And Preferencing,” ending all diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility “mandates, policies, programs, preferences, and activities in the Federal Government, under whatever name they appear.” Employees in DEI-specific positions were fired; DEI positions and offices were dismantled; and DEI training programs, newsletters, and promotion criteria were scrapped.
But it would be beyond naive to think that just because federal agencies are not currently promoting DEI that their workforces do not still widely hold the opinions they were encouraged to hold. Thousands of current federal employees participated in or supported DEI programs. Even those who might disagree were coerced to back DEI if they wanted to keep their jobs.
This means that the problem of getting rid of DEI in the federal government is multi-dimensional. For one, the federal bureaucracy recruits from institutions that are overwhelmingly liberal in composition—with twice as many professors identifying as liberal than conservative—that ideologically forms each new generation of the workforce. In his new excellent collection of essays, Seeking Truth and Speaking Truth: Law and Morality in Our Cultural Moment, Princeton professor Robert P. George argues that our top universities
permit prevailing opinions on campus to harden into dogmas, dogmas that go largely unchallenged, leaving students with the false belief that there are in fact no disputes on these matters among reasonable people of goodwill. At the problem’s core is the toxic thing that provides an environment in which illiberalism flourishes, namely, the phenomenon of groupthink.
Consider that the universities whose graduates most commonly end up in federal service—including George Washington, Georgetown, Michigan, Maryland, and American—are all redoubts of the Left. For example, 95.45% of GW employees donated to Democratic candidates in the 2020 election. A 2020 Michigan Daily survey found that more than 75% of University of Michigan students described themselves as “somewhat liberal” or “very liberal.” None of this is particularly surprising.
Moreover, federal service is often a means of instituting a peculiar progressive political vision that is multinational, if not post-national, in nature. In a recent Wall Street Journal article discussing cuts in the federal government, one employee explained, “For almost all of my colleagues, this was more than a job. We all got into this work not for power or wealth but to help women and girls and help advance equality globally.” Note that nothing in that employee’s “mission statement” has to do with advancing U.S. policy objectives, which is, after all, the stated purpose of every federal agency.
There is also the fact that for decades federal agencies were given incredible latitude to push blatantly ideologically liberal initiatives. Those involved in federal recruiting were told that although they could not make a hiring decision based on race or sex, they needed to help their respective federal agency boost their diversity hiring numbers, which effectively amounted to the same thing. The tenets of critical theory—including its antagonism toward Western civilization, white men, and Christianity—became so central to federal service that conservative and Christian employees regularly found themselves confronted with fundamental questions of conscience regarding their employment.
There is then a great need to replace the overarching role DEI has played in the federal government for decades. What is required is an alternative vision of public service, one that has a constitutionally informed narrative about American history and law. Claremont’s Chris Ross has already hinted at what this would look like in his earlier piece at The American Mind. Ross noted the need for training that discourages federal employees from weaponizing government, and includes “heaping doses of civics and sound American political theory.” But much more can be done.
Federal agencies in the past have routinely brought in guest speakers to discuss various topics related to mission-specific topics. Speaker series should be introduced across the government that articulate the Framers’ constitutional understanding of the government’s role and its relationship to various agency missions, be it trade, education, immigration, or law enforcement.
For years, apparatchiks from HR and other offices flooded employees’ email inboxes with DEI-themed announcements and newsletters—why not turn the tables and designate officials to regularly inform the workforce on constitutional principles or U.S. history? Promotion criteria could even be tethered to employees’ participation in these activities. If we expect medical professionals, lawyers, and educators to pursue continuing education for licensing, why shouldn’t the federal workforce be expected to do the same regarding the Constitution and the American civilization they are supposed to represent and serve?
I presume the same intellectuals and writers at Claremont and elsewhere who for many years have offered their incisive criticism of the federal workforce as deviating from constitutional norms would be more than happy to offer their services to reeducate Washington. These voices could be leveraged to offer their expertise to make the federal workforce into a truly pro-American vision of the Constitution and our national identity.
The anthropology of the Framers was “sober, realistic, and devoid of both excessive optimism and debilitating pessimism,” argues Daniel J. Mahoney in his new collection of essays, The Persistence of the Ideological Lie: The Totalitarian Impulse Then and Now. That anthropology is desperately needed in a federal workforce that has been grossly misinformed regarding the purpose and function of our government.
It’s undoubtedly true that many employees are simply waiting out the current administration, and no amount of catechesis will dissuade them of their woke beliefs. But as recent elections have demonstrated, many are awakening from their ideological slumber, and need only a little exposure to something besides the groupthink they’ve been fed since their childhood. “The increasingly obligatory alphabetical agitprops must be resisted and challenged,” writes Mahoney. The opportunity to get rid of the DEI virus is here. We must take advantage of it.
The American Mind presents a range of perspectives. Views are writers’ own and do not necessarily represent those of The Claremont Institute.
The American Mind is a publication of the Claremont Institute, a non-profit 501(c)(3) organization, dedicated to restoring the principles of the American Founding to their rightful, preeminent authority in our national life. Interested in supporting our work? Gifts to the Claremont Institute are tax-deductible.
