The Identity Reckoning

On February 14, 2025, the US Department of Education issued a “dear colleague” letter that signaled a sweeping crackdown on diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives in higher education. The letter expanded the department’s interpretation of the US Supreme Court’s 2023 decision in Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard, which struck down race-based admissions, to apply to academic and campus programming more broadly. Framed as guidance, the letter gave colleges and universities fourteen days to comply with ambiguously worded new requirements that mandated eliminating race-based decision making throughout all programs (including indirect methods or proxies for considering race) or risk losing their federal funding for supporting initiatives that favor “divisive concepts.” 

Institutions across the country scrambled to comply. The University of Pennsylvania, Carnegie Mellon University, the University of Pittsburgh, the University of Cincinnati, and the University of Alaska scrubbed their websites of all references to DEI. One day before the deadline, Ted Carter, president of Ohio State University, announced that his institution was closing two DEI offices and eliminating more than a dozen related staff positions.

In the months since the letter, institutions have cut courses, research initiatives, and faculty and staff positions related to DEI and dismantled student support networks, such as affinity groups for African American students. “This isn’t just about DEI,” says Monica Johnson, the director of the women’s and LGBTQ+ resource centers at Bloomsburg University. “It’s about erasing the frameworks that allow marginalized students to be seen, supported, and studied.”

Right-wing political attacks on diverse identities in higher education significantly predate the Education Department’s “dear colleague” letter but have accelerated and expanded rapidly during the second Trump term. The administration argues that DEI initiatives constitute illegal racial discrimination and violate the Constitution by giving preferential treatment based on race, gender, or identity rather than merit. Critics of the administration’s actions assert that beneath that legal framework, the broader goal is to eliminate institutional support for equity, reassert conservative cultural dominance, and discourage public institutions from acknowledging systemic inequalities. In this view, legal arguments serve as a cover for a wider political project to reshape what, and who, public higher education is for.

By targeting programs, curricula, and policies that support racial, gender, and LGBTQ+ equity, the Trump administration’s actions endanger the safety and well-being of faculty and students from historically marginalized groups and threaten to erode higher education’s time-honored mission of fostering critical inquiry and civic responsibility. Such actions “undermine the fundamental purposes of higher education and violate principles of academic freedom by imposing political litmus tests on teaching, research, and campus life,” warned the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) in a 2024 statement.

Events have moved quickly since President Donald Trump returned to the White House. In January 2025, Trump issued a series of far-reaching executive orders that pressured colleges and universities to dismantle DEI programs by tying compliance to accreditation, federal funding, and legal risk. 

One order, EO 14151, instructed the Education Department to withhold grants and financial aid from institutions that maintain DEI offices, identity-based programs, or race- and gender-conscious trainings. Another, EO 14173, revoked race-based requirements for federal contractors, undercutting the hiring and recruitment practices of public universities. A third, EO 14168, imposed strict binary definitions of sex, targeting DEI programs that include support for LGBTQ+ students. The February “dear colleague” letter then intensified this pressure by warning that DEI initiatives themselves could also trigger civil rights investigations. 

In April, the administration began leveraging accreditation to achieve political goals, directing the Education Department to threaten accreditation status and federal funding for institutions maintaining DEI-focused curricula, admissions, or faculty recruitment. A White House fact sheet stated that accreditors have “abused their authority by imposing discriminatory diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI)-based standards.” The Department of Justice opened a federal “anti-fraud” unit to probe more than fifty universities, including those in the University of California system, for race- or sex-based preferences in hiring or admissions. 

These events have had a chilling effect. Many institutions are overcomplying and preemptively retreating from DEI initiatives amid concerns about federal reprisals, explains Shaun Harper, chief executive officer of the University of Southern California Race and Equity Center. “Fear has spread across the entire landscape of US higher education, leading many institutions to rename, defund, or completely abandon all DEI-related efforts,” Harper says. 

Even campuses in blue states—such as Northeastern University in Massachusetts and the University of California system—have cut staff, rebranded programs, and revised mission statements in an effort to reduce legal exposure and save federal funds, a surprising move given their public commitments to diversity and state-level protections like California’s AB 1602 which defends DEI initiatives at public institutions. In a watershed moment, University of Virginia (UVA) President James E. Ryan resigned in June 2025 after the Justice Department demanded he depart as a condition for resolving an investigation into whether the university had sufficiently complied with orders to ban DEI. The UVA Board of Visitors, the institution’s governing board, feared the loss of federal research grants and other funding if UVA retained Ryan, according to multiple news outlets. Some Republican-appointed board members were also motivated by objections to what they saw as Ryan’s imposing his own liberal ethics and values on college students, reported the New York Times.

Critics warn that overcomplying and quickly eliminating DEI programs weakens institutional values, abandons vulnerable communities, and undermines both pedagogy and academic freedom. “The whole point of education is to create a learned society,” says Lori Patton-Davis, professor of education at the University of California, Los Angeles “However, this goal is lost if information and knowledge acquisition is dictated by the limited view of politicians or others who think education can only happen in one particular way.”

The Trump administration’s overall approach also represents a bold tactical shift in long-running right-wing attacks against diversity in higher education, explains Cecilia Muñoz, who served as director of the White House Domestic Policy Council under President Barack Obama. The Trump White House is taking an extraordinary role in driving the situation, she says, including using federal funding to propel its agenda forward. “The administration is using an age-old fight over diversity in higher education as a wedge to open a broader attack,” Muñoz says. “It appears intended to weaken the entire sector and is incredibly dangerous for our democracy.”

The Trump administration’s actions against DEI in higher education are likely to take a toll on students’ mental health, sense of belonging, and overall success. For students of color, LGBTQ+ students, and other marginalized groups, eliminating DEI offices and programs has already meant the disappearance of trusted faculty, safe spaces, and institutional support. “The loss of mentors and protectors has engendered tremendous grief in students as they’ve seen those people unjustly fired,” Harper says. 

Research from the National Education Association (NEA) shows that DEI programs directly support student persistence, retention, and graduation, particularly for first-generation and historically underrepresented students. Similarly, college students in STEM fields who are from historically marginalized communities are 30 percent more likely to leave their programs when DEI support structures—such as mentorship programs, affinity groups, and inclusive teaching practices—are reduced or eliminated, according to a 2024 University of Michigan study. Without such programs, these students are more likely to struggle emotionally and face increased academic and financial risk. In the long run, cutting DEI programs could deepen societal inequality, stifle social mobility, and weaken the diverse talent pipeline that higher education has sought to cultivate for the US workforce in recent decades.

Efforts to dismantle DEI initiatives on campus are especially affecting the LGBTQ+ community. “When students do not have access to support, there will be horrible consequences for their ability to be themselves, thrive, or even survive at certain institutions,” says Genny Beemyn, director of the Stonewall Center at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. 

Under federal pressure, institutions are disbanding LGBTQ+ resource centers, canceling Pride events, and restricting or eliminating gender-inclusive housing. Marc Stein, a San Francisco State University historian of LGBTQ+ rights, frames this moment as a brutal backlash: “Experiencing reversals after a period of progress can be psychologically devastating because people had been gaining hope of positive change and now those hopes are dashed.” 

Trump’s executive orders have also focused on trans athletes, with one directive (titled “Keeping Men out of Women’s Sports”) barring institutions that receive federal funds from allowing transgender students to compete according to their stated gender identity. In response, the University of Pennsylvania banned transgender women from competing in women’s sports and erased records set by transgender athletes like swimmer Lia Thomas. The resulting damage is about more than the relatively small number of athletes directly affected, Stein explains, but rather extends to how these policies become a weapon to induce societal reactions that far outweigh the actual scope of the issue. 

Stein also reports that LGBTQ+ students are sharing fears of being intentionally misgendered in class, policed in bathrooms, or verbally and physically harassed in public forums—all signs of an academic climate growing increasingly unsafe for LGBTQ+ individuals. “The Trump administration has created a permission structure that gives free rein to the expression of hostility and hatred,” Stein says. Beemyn believes the ultimate goal is to “completely erase us and pretend we do not exist.”

Faculty from marginalized groups are also facing increased harassment and professional instability due to the elimination of institutional structures and policies that once offered protections, such as bias incident reporting systems and faculty senate DEI committees. “This is an extraordinarily stressful time for people who have been placed in the political crosshairs,” Harper says. In addition, scholars in fields like gender studies, African American studies, and ethnic studies are losing funding and jobs as institutions shutter programs and end research projects or DEI initiatives. Faculty of color are disproportionately affected because they are more likely than other faculty to hold DEI-related roles on campus. “Not only is their perspective and commitment to diversity no longer valued,” says Emerson Sykes, a lawyer for the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), “it’s now actually seen as suspect.” 

Academic freedom is increasingly threatened as courses, departments, and entire fields of study disappear. “The risks are the stifling of free thought and beliefs,” warns Annette Gordon-Reed, a Pulitzer Prize–winning historian and professor of law at Harvard University. “The message is that only certain views will be supported.” 

Amy Reid, a French language and literature scholar, experienced political interference with academic freedom firsthand at New College of Florida after Governor Ron DeSantis initiated a conservative takeover of the institution in January 2023. The changes included eliminating the college’s gender studies program, which Reid chaired, and disposing hundreds of related books from the library. (Reid has taken an unpaid leave of absence and now works at PEN America, a nonprofit organization that seeks to protect freedom of expression.) “I’ve seen the ways right-wing ideologues try to stifle debate, literally telling some of us to shut up,” Reid says. The stakes, she says, go beyond the professoriate. “Academic freedom is really about my students’ ability to access information freely.” 

The broader implications may reach beyond individual programs or faculty jobs to ultimately challenge the role of colleges and universities as spaces for inquiry, civic preparation, and democratic engagement. Higher education is becoming a front line in a broader authoritarian push, Gordon-Reed says. “The current crisis grows out of making fellow Americans—political opponents in other times—implacable enemies,” she says. 

Muñoz notes that in order to sow fear and division, autocratic regimes target academic disciplines that foster critical thinking, historical awareness, and open debate. “Autocracies don’t have liberal arts institutions. There’s a reason for that,” Muñoz says. Because it encourages intellectual independence and civic engagement, both of which can undermine authoritarian control, autocracies avoid liberal education, according to a 2020 study by Georgetown researchers. Reid puts it plainly: “If we want an educated and engaged citizenry, we need to encourage people to ask questions and find their own answers—not simply be sheep following what someone else says they should learn or study.”

Given the magnitude of current events, how can individual institutions and the higher education sector respond?

Within colleges and universities, the path forward can begin with everyday acts of resistance and solidarity, Stein says. Faculty can demonstrate allyship through inclusive teaching, like integrating women’s history into general survey courses, and displaying rainbow flags or equity statements in their offices. 

Students, too, have an essential role, Harper explains. Through investigative campus journalism, student government resolutions, and activism, students can combat disinformation and problematic policies. Institutions can help students by expanding mental health resources and offering support groups.

Coordinated responses are also emerging. Collective statements from organizations like AAUP, the American Council on Education, and the American Association of Colleges and Universities have reaffirmed the core values of academic freedom and inclusion. Cross-institutional alliances such as the National DEI Defense Coalition, the Big Ten Mutual Defense Compact, and the Consortium of Higher Education LGBT Resource Professionals are coordinating legal support, sharing resources, and compiling data for lawsuits and legislative advocacy. They’re also organizing synchronized campus actions like teach-ins, vigils, and awareness campaigns. Legal challenges are under way as well, including the NEA and ACLU’s lawsuit challenging the Trump administration’s February 2025 “dear colleague” letter. The lawsuit argues that the administration unlawfully pressured colleges to eliminate DEI programs by threatening federal funding and that it infringed on academic freedom, chilled protected speech, and lacked clear legal authority.

As attacks on diversity escalate, many argue that silence is no longer an option. “We need to speak up and speak out,” Reid says. “We need to help people understand that higher education matters not because it’s separate from the rest of society but because it’s an intrinsic part of it.” 

As Muñoz puts it, “This is a moment for courage, and courage is contagious.” 

Illustration by David Weissberg