Zuckerberg kills DEI programs as Meta spirals further toward MAGA

On Friday, Meta announced that it will be ending its diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs, effective immediately. This is the second drastic change the company has announced ahead of President-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration.

Meta Vice President of Human Services Janelle Gale announced the move to employees in an internal memo, which was obtained by Axios.

“The legal and policy landscape surrounding diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts in the United States is changing. The Supreme Court of the United States has recently made decisions signaling a shift in how courts will approach DEI,” the memo read.

It goes on to say that the term “DEI” has “become charged” in part because “it is understood by some as a practice that suggests preferential treatment of some groups over others.” 

But that might be sugarcoating it. 

DEI has become a go-to scapegoat for conservatives, who blame it for everything from Kamala Harris’ Democratic presidential nomination to the ongoing wildfires in California. While DEI is really just a way of embracing people’s differences—whether that be age, physical ability, race, or socioeconomic status—it has long been used by conservatives as a racist dog whistle to question the qualifications of people of color, particularly those seeking or holding powerful positions in government.

While DEI initiatives exploded in 2020 and 2021, they’re undergoing a reckoning of sorts—and not just in Republican-led areas. While it’s true that red states are dismantling DEI efforts in public institutions, corporations are also cutting back on DEI spending and personnel.

On Monday, McDonald’s announced that it was winding down some of its DEI policies, and this past November, Walmart did the same. So Meta is not alone in its most recent change—but that doesn’t make it any better. 

With this change, Meta will no longer have a team focused on DEI, according to the memo. Instead, Meta Chief Diversity Officer Maxine Williams will take on a new role focused on “accessibility and engagement.” Meta will also sunset its supplier diversity efforts and plans to replace DEI training programs with ones on “how to apply fair and consistent practices that mitigate bias for all, no matter your background.”

Friday’s news follows Meta’s appointment of MAGA-friendly Policy chief Joel Kaplan. This week, Meta also announced plans to disband its third-party fact-checking team and replace it with a community notes-style system similar to the one used on X. Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg also gave a whopping $1 million donation to Trump’s inauguration committee.

Appearing on a Friday episode of Joe Rogan’s podcast, Zuckerberg lamented the pressure from the government and “legacy media” to push for censorship. He also took a dig at President Joe Biden, claiming that members of his administration berated his team to take down posts related to COVID-19 vaccines. 

“It just got to this point where we were like, no, we’re not going to take down things that are true. That’s ridiculous,” he said.

Ah, so now we know why Zuckerberg is cozying up to Trump: He’s holding a grudge!

Meanwhile, in an attempt to rationalize the company’s recent DEI-related decisions, Kaplan told Fox News that the decision to slash DEI is “about doing what’s best for our company and ensuring that we are serving everyone and building teams with the most talented people.”

“This means evaluating people as individuals, and sourcing people from a range of candidate pools, but never making hiring decisions based on protected characteristics like race or gender,” he said.

Perhaps Zuckerberg sees his series of pro-Trump decisions as a way to curry favor with the president-elect. And while Meta’s decision to end its DEI initiatives didn’t happen in a vacuum, it’s disappointing nonetheless.