Ahead of the inauguration of United States President-elect Donald Trump, Meta and Amazon have begun winding down their diversity programs due to growing conservative opposition to initiatives like it.

Facebook owner Meta is ending its diversity, equity, and inclusion programs (DEI), it said to employees in an internal memo on Friday, January 10. These programs include those for hiring, training, and picking suppliers.

Meta will no longer have a dedicated team for DEI programs. Its chief diversity officer Maxine Williams will take on a new role “focused on accessibility and engagement,” according to the memo.

In an exclusive story by Axios, Janelle Gale, Meta’s Vice President of Human Resources, was quoted as saying in the memo: “The legal and policy landscape surrounding diversity, equity and inclusion efforts in the United States is changing.”

Over at online shopping platform Amazon, management sent out an internal memo in December saying it was in the process of “winding down outdated programs and materials” as part of a broader review of other initiatives.

Amazon aimed to complete the process by the end of 2024.

For Meta, the scaling back of its DEI program is the latest of the company’s initiatives that appear to court Trump, days before his inauguration on January 20.

In the last two weeks, Meta scrapped its fact-checking program in the US, tapped Republican Joel Kaplan to lead its global policy team, and elected Dana White, a close friend of Trump and CEO of the Ultimate Fighting Championship, to its board.

Meta’s decision to halt the fact-checking program was met with stark criticism from democracy watchdogs around the world.

The social media giant, led by Mark Zuckerberg, has been trying to appease Trump, who before criticized Meta’s political content policies and even threatened Zuckerberg with imprisonment.

In December, Meta announced a $1-million contribution to Trump’s inaugural fund. Wall Street and Silicon Valley have also pledged donations.

Even as the United States has long been characterized by its diversity, conservative groups have denounced DEI programs in companies and threatening to sue over them, emboldened by a US Supreme Court ruling in 2023 that struck down affirmative action policies in two universities’ admissions decisions.

Meta’s Gale pointed to recent SC decisions that “[signaled] a shift” in how US courts may approach DEI programs in the future. – Rappler.com