Corporate diversity push: How it’s shaken as affirmative action ends

Now that the U.S. Supreme Court has struck down affirmative action at colleges and universities, conservatives are turning their fire on corporations. The struggle over companies’ diversity efforts has already begun.

Following the June 29 decision, the House of Representatives passed a defense policy bill with several social policy amendments tacked on, including the elimination of the Pentagon’s programs for diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI). Republican attorneys general in 13 states sent a letter warning America’s largest corporations of “serious legal consequences” for their DEI initiatives. And on Friday, the president of Texas A&M University resigned because the hiring of a high-profile journalism professor came under fire for her past work on diversity.

Activists on both sides of the issue expect the fallout to spread.