LAS VEGAS (KLAS) – In the wake of President Trump’s executive order outlawing District, Equity, and Inclusion initiatives for any U.S. business or academic institution that receives federal funding, UNLV’s president defended his university’s hiring practices saying, “We’re still people. We’re all going to have our diversity pieces to our background and some of that comes out.”
Under questioning from the 8 News Now Investigators after UNLV President Keith Whitfield’s State of the University address on Thursday, UNLV’s top boss said that job descriptions requiring faculty to “demonstrate support for diversity, equity and inclusiveness” and a document providing guidance on hiring diverse candidates – with a score sheet – do not properly articulate the university’s recruitment process.
“I think there have been some thoughts that we’re trying to brainwash people,” Whitfield said, in response to a question about whether UNLV teaches ideology on both sides of the DEI debate. “It’s like, no. What we try to do is to offer opportunities to be able to understand difference of, different perspectives. We’re a national university.”
That national university, is now caught up in a national debate ever since Trump – who recently said to a group of reporters that “DEI would have ruined our country, and now it’s dead” – wound back DEI initiatives that became commonplace on Wall St. and in higher education. UNLV has one of the most diverse college campuses in the nation, Whitfield said.
“For our policy,” Whitfield said, “it’s always been about talent. You know, we try to get the best.”
Rashi Jawade, CEO of the Texas nonprofit Embracing Equity, says corporations and colleges began to buy into the notion of DEI if not just the acronym after George Floyd was murdered by a Minneapolis police officer in May 2020, during the Covid-19 pandemic.
“Because that happened during the pandemic, when we couldn’t really avert our gaze, everybody in the nation – and I would say across the globe, had a spotlight to the clear inequities and racism that we see in the United States,” Jawade, who has done work in Las Vegas preparing teachers and helping diversity universities, said. “As a result of that clear, glaring spotlight, there were many corporations and universities and, you know, anybody really, any company, that was like, oh, this feels like we need to do something. We need to ensure, you know, that we’re being responsive to this moment.”
She said some companies’ responsiveness was integrated with their business principles, and others wanted to seem more egalitarian and inclusive.
“I think there were a lot of companies … that kind of jumped in … without actually, I think, thinking through what does this mean for us as a company? What is DEI other than just diversity, equity, and inclusion?”
Scott Curran, a lawyer and college professor in Chicago, who represents high-profile clients in the so-called DEI space, says DEI has existed – and will continue to exist – without the controversial acronym.
“I’ve never counseled clients to solve for one acronym or another, but to realize this is all part of the ways in which institutions, organizations, and individuals in civil society do good in their work and in their organizations and in their life,” Curran told the 8 News Now Investigators. “And so it’s OK if we have to reframe the language we use or if we have to change the acronyms we use, or if we have to stop using certain acronyms.”
Curran pointing out the trend of private-sector organizations adopting Corporate Social Responsibility as early as the 1950s and the decades that followed, was one example of a similar trend. He says today’s companies and unviersity’s relying on federal funding will not want to run afoul of the law of the land, but will seek clarity in the courts.
“That is part of the American experiment,” Curran said. “And if we address it fairly honestly, openly, if we care about democratic institutions like the rule of law, like the courts, like our legislative bodies and our executives, we’ll get through this.”
To that end, most recently, while reactions to Trump’s DEI mandates have been strong and varied, the city of Baltimore sued the Republican administration over DEI program cuts Monday in federal court, declaring them unconstitutional.