The Attack on Anti-Racism Projects and Programs
In September 2020, near the end of the first Trump presidency, Fox News host Tucker Carlson interviewed Christopher Rufo, a 36-year-old senior fellow of the Manhattan Institute, a conservative think tank. Rufo had recently published articles condemning Critical Race Theory and programs of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) at colleges, universities, and large corporations. Rufo characterized these programs as a liberal conspiracy whose goal was to take over the federal government. On the show Rufo called upon the president, who happened to be watching the show, to abolish such programs in federal agencies. The president responded by issuing an executive order to do exactly that. When Joe Biden won the 2020 election, he cancelled Trump’s anti- DEI orders
However, when Trump began his second term in 2024, he picked up what he had started and continued his assault on CRT and DEI by threatening to withhold funding to universities, nonprofits and corporate entities that rely on government funding if they did not rid their programs form a focus on DEI or CRT. He also passed an executive order calling for the removal of books from libraries and courses in universities that dealt with issues of race and ethnic discrimination and programs in histories of minority groups like African Americans, Latinos, and Native Americans.
Meanwhile, Rufo has gone on to become a major spokesperson for the administration on what he considers to be liberals’ antiracism conspiracy in the educational and cultural life of the nation. He currently serves on the Board of New College, a state-sponsored university in Florida and is conducting what they call an ideological takeover focused on removing DEI programs and the teaching of Critical Race Theory. As a recent guest on the Ezra Klein show, Rufo talked about his efforts to move educational corporate organizations away from these anti-racism efforts. Rufo has gone on to try and make the case that the people suffering most from racial discrimination are not People of Color, but rather white men. As a white man, I find such beliefs and actions not only ludicrous, but also in no way supported by the data of who dominates most workplaces, holds the most power, and receives the highest income. Not only do white men surpass people of color, but also women, both white and BIPOC, when it comes to hiring and the programs designed to address racist policies and actions in the workplace.
White Men in a Diverse Job Market
According to Rufo, he has over a thousand stories where white men lost out in a job opportunity or a promotion to men and women of color. My first thought was how many times have they also lost out to other white men? The assumption behind the claims of discrimination is that people of color and women are by their very nature less skilled and qualified than white men. So when they are hired, especially over a white man, they are hired because of their race or their gender. Not so.
In my book Disrupting Whiteness: Talking with White People About Racism, I tell the story of applying for a job in the admissions office of a private university in Philadelphia. The Admissions Director interviewing me, who I had known in another context, told me I should not get my hopes up because he was being pressed to hire a person of color for the position. As it turned out, the position was filled by an African American woman, who in many ways was far more qualified for the job than me. She went on to hold other responsibilities in the organization and eventually went on to be the president of another academic institution. While I do not know how and why she was hired over me, there was no question she had been hired, not because she was Black or was a woman but because she was far more qualified.
Projecting Adult Guilt onto Children
Once I was approached by a pastor friend of mine who told me about a highly touted private elementary school that had developed a curriculum designed to discuss issues of racial discrimination in U.S. history and current history with young students. The parents were upset at the school because children were coming home saying that white people were responsible for killing and the taking of land from Native Americans and enslaving African Americans. The students were not feeling bad for what they had been told, but the parents were terribly upset They were afraid that their children might develop negative self-image because of what they were learning about racism in school. I told my friend that I didn’t know the whole situation, but it sounded to me like the parents were the ones feeling ashamed and guilty, not their children, and they were projecting that guilt onto their children.
Shortly after this conversation, the president issued an executive order calling on public schools to remove some of the more demonstrative examples of racial discrimination. The executive order from the president demanded that U.S. history books, films, and other educational media in the curriculum needed to be changed and/or removed. Again the action was taken not because the things being taught were not part of our history as a nation, but because for many white people, the history of racism is a source of discomfort, guilt and even shame. Unfortunately, teachers have lost their jobs because they did not back down from telling the truth. Superintendents have been fired because they have focused “too much” on such issues in the minds of parents. It appears racism and the discomfort it brings to white people, had won.
The Case for Diversity Affirming Programs
In the anthology of articles, Standing Strong in Undemocratic Times, Education professors Geneva Gay and Robin DiAngelo argue that white Americans should see their discomfort and shame as barriers to appreciating the diversity of the US population as an asset, rather than a problem to be eradicated. Gay puts it this way:
Diversity is and always has been a salient feature of the United States. To argue that this is not the case is to deny reality. Therefore, a primary purpose of endorsing diversity is to recognize, respect, and respond to its persistence. Recognizing, valuing, and confirming diversity is essential for effective education of students from diverse racial, ethnic, cultural, and linguistic groups.
In other words, diversity should be celebrated and promoted rather than feared and eliminated. The purpose of DEI programs is not to favor one group over another but to help people build bridges of cooperation, appreciation, understanding, and shared goals. The purpose of courses that focus on the history of discrimination is to enable students to learn from mistakes and develop new ways of communicating and appreciating what people bring to the table, regardless of the racial, ethnic, gender, or sexual identity they might be.
Geneva Gay concludes her article this way:
Knowledge about and skills in diversity are necessities, not luxuries. If youth of today and the future[and I would add their parents] are to be prepared to function adequately in their nations and the world , they must be knowledgeable about and skilled in multiple diversities.
In other words, we do ourselves and our children no favors by banning books, shutting down programs, and removing people from our society because their race, ethnicity, language and much more is different than the whiteness that has fed discrimination, riled up hate, led to deaths of the innocent, and crippled us as a country to function effectively and meaningfully in a multicolored, diverse world.
As a professor emeritus who taught courses on racism at the graduate and undergraduate level, I wholeheartedly agree with Dr. Gay’s perspective. More than once, I had white students who had completed my course on racism express frustration about why they had not been exposed to this information at a younger age. We do ourselves and the young people in our midst no favors by hiding these truths. Despite the pressures and challenges on educators to “whitewash” the topic of racism and its history, we must continue to press the truth of our racist past and present.
Sources
Drick Boyd. (2021)Disrupting Whiteness: Talking with White People About Race. Arch St. Press: Philadelphia
Robin DiAngelo. (2026). White Racial Shame and the Permanence of Racism: A Critical Hope Response. Standing Strong in Undemocratic Times. New York: Teacher’s College Press.
Geneva Gay (2026. Resisting Resistance to Diversity. Standing Strong in Undemocratic Times. New York: Teacher’s College Press.
Ezra Klein, June 30, 2026. Chris Rufo Thinks the Right Can Control This. I don’t. The Ezra Klein Show. Accessed on https://the-ezra-klein-show.simplecast.com/episodes/chris-rufo