From the start, the Trump administration’s war on diversity has not just been an effort to roll back civil rights. It is a campaign to stop the flow of certain types of information and halt the progress that has aided the betterment and decency of the United States for the past 250 years.

The first indication of what was to come appeared in Project 2025, which called for the reversal of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) policies. But as we have seen so far, Trump’s DOGE foot soldiers have gone far beyond their initial stated goal of eliminating DEI initiatives throughout the federal government as they attempt to rewrite our history – and perhaps our future – through executive orders.

Much of the controversy over DEI comes down to some fundamental misunderstandings about what the term means – confusion that has been either created or facilitated by the White House. Put simply, DEI is a framework used by some organizations and institutions to promote fair treatment and full participation for all people, especially those who have historically been discriminated against or underrepresented due to past legal barriers or norms. Diversity is inclusive of people from differing socio-economic backgrounds, as well as across race, ethnicity, gender, age, sexual orientation, disability, nationality and more. The Equity lens focuses on fairness by ensuring access to opportunities. Inclusion fosters an atmosphere where everyone is valued, respected and heard.

Heck, any young kid on the playground intuitively gets DEI — basically be fair, let all the kids play, and encourage those that are shy or apprehensive to join in. In a nation that actively and legally suppressed the rights, circumstances and dreams of large swaths of people since its inception, it seems an openness to DEI would be obvious and welcomed. It is worth pointing out that the more Americans understand what DEI actually represents, the more they support a variety of DEI initiatives.

The Trump administration, on the other hand, talks about DEI as a form of discrimination. As one of the White House’s first executive orders put it, “Illegal DEI and DEIA policies not only violate the text and spirit of our longstanding Federal civil rights laws, they also undermine our national unity, as they deny, discredit, and undermine the traditional American values of hard work, excellence, and individual achievement in favor of an unlawful, corrosive, and pernicious identity-based spoils system.” The order goes on to assert that DEI policies threaten public safety by promoting unqualified people in “key sectors of American society.” It should go without saying that DEI is not against the law – and given the administration’s hiring practices, it’s hard to know what to make of their complaints about unqualified people in key sectors.

It’s not just that the White House treats DEI as if it were against the law. DOGE and the Trump administration have conflated DEI with anything having to do with our diverse, multicultural country. The anti-DEI crusade is being widely used to whitewash the boundless diversity and beauty that is America’s palette, while ignoring systemic inequities and fostering division.

DEI and Demographics

The war on DEI also appears to require an opposition to the collection and/or reporting of data itself. Many outlets (e.g., NPR, NBC News, Harvard, and Politico) have been reporting on missing and sometimes reappearing data, and government web pages that have been altered.

Demographics are characteristics such as age, gender, race, ethnicity, class, income, education, occupation, disability, and more that describe populations or defined groups of people. Wide-ranging and comprehensive demographic insights are used by businesses, governments, and organizations to make informed decisions such as tailoring marketing strategies, shaping public policies, or understanding societal trends.

DEI and demographics are not the same, but both are critical to the United States. Importantly, there is an overlap in that DEI necessitates the assessment of demographics to understand the world and achieve some of its goals.

Together, statistically-informed demographic assessments of our country and DEI initiatives work to inform and remedy vast and deep inequities and unfairness that so many experience as individuals and groups. Throughout our history, injustice and unfairness – especially along lines that include race, ethnicity and gender – were at best overlooked, and at worst condoned in the form of explicit policy that kept many from full participation in life.

But the Trump administration’s conflating of DEI and demographics (or descriptors that highlight diversity) is why applications for federal money are reviewed if certain words are used in grant applications. For example, the National Science Foundation flagged applications if terms like female, women, disability, inequality, gender, race and ethnicity, and LGBT are used in the application. It’s the same reason why the Pentagon and other government agencies are purging content from their webpages; they want no mention or images of diversity efforts or commemorative months for Blacks, Hispanics or women.

To ignore diversity, or to treat efforts to remedy discrimination as illegal, is a major step backwards. In my career as an economist, and CEPR’s 25 years of analyzing and reflecting on economic issues, demographics and fairness are central. In a world where we do not collect or report data along demographic lines, we will not be able to assess the variability of wages, family income, poverty, educational attainment, or various types of cancer experienced differently by various slices of America. We won’t be informed of disparate outcomes on important issues and inequities that often require various remedies to address. And this is by design. The Trump administration is pursuing a YOYO social and economic system – you’re on your own – and there is no need for statistics or assessments of fairness and decency.

Our diversity is our strength, our future and — quite frankly — a major contributor to what makes the US wonderful and good.