McDonald's, Meta and DEI in the Trump era
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As President-elect Trump prepares to take office Monday, companies like McDonald's and Meta have buckled to political pressure and announced changes and cuts to their DEI policies.
Why it matters: Retreating on diversity, equity and inclusion goals will likely result in less diversity within these corporations.
- A majority of Americans support programs that promote more workplace representation and anti-bias training, according to a Washington Post poll released last year.
Driving the news: Chicago-based McDonald's this month laid out modifications to its current DEI practices, such as no longer setting "aspirational representation goals."
- A Meta employee memo obtained by Axios outlined how the company was immediately getting rid of its major DEI programs, including initiatives around hiring.
Yes, but: At some corporations, it may be more about a name change than shifting policy.
- "It's just called inclusion [now] instead of diversity," Northwestern business and psychology professor Ivuoma N. Onyeador tells Axios. "There are activist lawsuits being filed against diversity, especially racially focused diversity policies, and so I think to kind of forestall those lawsuits, there's shifts being done now."
The big picture: The Supreme Court decision banning affirmative action in colleges put corporate DEI in the crosshairs. McDonald's and Meta, among other companies, have cited the legal environment as the basis for DEI policy changes.
State of play: An anti-affirmative action group in Nashville is suing McDonald's over its longstanding Hispanic and Latino scholarship program, CBS reported this week. The company says it has awarded $33 million since the program started in 1985.
- Even government agencies are seeing the fallout from litigation. The Illinois Department of Transportation did not include a specific request for minority workers after contractors in Kentucky challenged a program in that state that has similar diversity goals to Illinois, Crain's reported.
The intrigue: Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul is still encouraging the use of these types of programs.
- "While educational institutions and government entities may need to re-examine certain race-based programs, diversity, equity and inclusion efforts are still beneficial and legal," Raoul wrote in an op-ed this week.
Between the lines: While Trump and MAGA activists claim DEI policies discriminate, experts say they actually benefit all employees.
- "For example, parental leave, more structured hiring and promotion processes that help reduce bias and advance the best talent," DEI expert Joelle Emerson wrote in the Harvard Business Review last month.
- "All the flack that companies are getting, there are these efforts being made to make the workplace better, to take care of employees ... that is in the same office, the DEI office does all that," Onyeador says.
Zoom in: In a letter to franchisees, employees and suppliers, McDonald's makes it clear that it's still dedicated to "inclusion," noting that in 2024, 30% of its U.S. leaders were from underrepresented groups and "78% of employees scored McDonald's positively on our Inclusion Index overall."
Zoom out: Other Illinois companies are split on how they're addressing DEI now.
- John Deere said it "will no longer participate in or support external social or cultural awareness parades, festivals, or events," while Rush announced this month that it hired a new chief DEI officer.
The bottom line: More lawsuits are probably on the way as Trump takes office Monday and most likely continues to attack DEI. As companies look to stay in the administration's good graces, they could bend to the pressure, even if it just means changing the language they use.