From LifeSiteNews

By Emily Mangiaracina

Trump’s shuttering of federal DEI programs is in keeping with his promise to ‘forge a society that is colorblind and merit-based.’

President Donald Trump has ordered all federal diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) staff to be placed on paid leave by Wednesday evening, in accordance with his executive order signed on Monday.

The president pledged during his inaugural address to “forge a society that is colorblind and merit-based,” which is the impetus behind his efforts to abolish DEI programs that prioritize race and ethnicity above merit when hiring workers.

Trump’s Executive Order on Ending Radical and Wasteful Government DEI Programs and Preferencing stated, “Americans deserve a government committed to serving every person with equal dignity and respect, and to expending precious taxpayer resources only on making America great.”

“President Trump campaigned on ending the scourge of DEI from our federal government and returning America to a merit based society where people are hired based on their skills, not for the color of their skin,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a statement Tuesday night. “This is another win for Americans of all races, religions, and creeds. Promises made, promises kept.”

The Office of Personnel Management issued a memo to the leaders of federal departments instructing them to inform employees by 5 p.m. ET on Wednesday that they will be placed on paid administrative leave as all DEI offices and programs prepare to shut down, according to NBC News.

It is unclear how many employees will be affected by the erasure of federal DEI programs.

Diversity training has “exploded” in the federal government since Joe Biden took office in 2020, the Beacon noted, with all federal agencies having mandated a form of DEI training before he left office.

DEI initiatives have long been widely denounced by conservatives and moderates as divisive, but they have been coming under increasing fire for undermining the competence and most basic functioning of public institutions and private corporations, even putting lives at risk.

For example, some commentators have blamed growing – and at times catastrophic and fatal – airplane safety failures in part on DEI hires and policies. Upon the revelation that a doctor at Duke Medical School was “abandoning… all sort(s) of metrics” in hiring surgeons in order to implement DEI practice, Elon Musk warned that “people will die” because of DEI.

Conservatives have also criticized DEI for stoking rather than curing division. A recent study shows that DEI programs actually breed hostility in businesses and schools.

From the Daily Caller News Foundation

By Thomas English

President Donald Trump’s Monday executive order establishing the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) presents a more modest scope for the initiative, focusing primarily on “modernizing federal technology and software.”

The executive order refashions the Obama-era United States Digital Service (USDS) into the United States DOGE Service. Then-President Barack Obama created USDS in 2014 to enhance the reliability and usability of online federal services after the disastrous rollout of HealthCare.gov, an insurance exchange website created through the Affordable Care Act (ACA). Trump’s USDS will now prioritize “modernizing federal technology and software to maximize efficiency and productivity” under the order, which makes no mention of slashing the federal budget, workforce or regulations — DOGE’s originally advertised purpose.

“I am pleased to announce that the Great Elon Musk, working in conjunction with American Patriot Vivek Ramaswamy, will lead the Department of Government Efficiency (‘DOGE’),” Trump said in his official announcement of the initiative in November. “Together, these two wonderful Americans will pave the way for my Administration to dismantle Government Bureaucracy, slash excess government regulations, cut wasteful expenditures, and restructure Federal Agencies.”

The order’s focus on streamlining federal technology and software stands in contrast to some of DOGE’s previously more expansive aims, including Elon Musk’s claim that “we can [cut the federal budget] by at least $2 trillion” at Trump’s Madison Square Garden rally in November. Musk now leads DOGE alone after Vivek Ramaswamy stepped down from the initiative Monday, apparently eying a 2026 gubernatorial run in Ohio.

The order says it serves to “advance the President’s 18-month DOGE agenda,” but omits many of the budget-cutting and workforce-slashing proposals during Trump’s campaign. Rather, the order positions DOGE as a technology modernization entity rather than an organization with direct authority to enact sweeping fiscal reforms. There is no mention, for instance, of trillions in budget cuts or a significant reduction in the federal workforce, though the president did separately enact a hiring freeze throughout the executive branch Monday.

“I can’t help but think that there’s more coming, that maybe more responsibilities will be added to it,” Susan Dudley, a public policy professor at George Washington University, told the Daily Caller News Foundation. Dudley, who was also the top regulatory official in former President George W. Bush’s administration, said the structure of the new USDS could impact the recent lawsuits against the DOGE effort.

“I think it maybe moots the lawsuit that’s been brought for it not being FACA,” Dudley said. “So if this is how it’s organized — that it’s people in the government who bring in these special government employees on a temporary basis, that might mean that the lawsuit doesn’t really have any ground.”

Three organizations — the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE), National Security Counselors (NSC) and Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) — separately filed lawsuits against DOGE within minutes of Trump signing the executive order. The suits primarily challenge DOGE’s compliance with the Federal Advisory Committee Act (FACA), alleging the department operates without the required transparency, balanced representation and public accountability.

The order also emphasizes not “be construed to impair or otherwise affect … the authority granted by law to an executive department or agency, or the head thereof; or the functions of the Director of the Office of Management and Budget relating to budgetary, administrative, or legislative proposals.”

“And the only mention of OMB [Office of Management and Budget] is some kind of boilerplate at the end — that it doesn’t affect that. But that’s kind of general stuff you often see in executive orders,” Dudley continued, adding she doesn’t “have an inside track” on whether further DOGE-related executive orders will follow.

“It’s certainly, certainly more modest than I think Musk was anticipating,” Dudley said.

Trump’s order also establishes “DOGE Teams” consisting of at least four employees: a team lead, a human resources specialist, an engineer and an attorney. Each team will be assigned an executive agency with which it will implement the president’s “DOGE agenda.”

It remains unclear whether Monday’s executive order comprehensively defines DOGE, or if additional orders will be forthcoming to broaden its mandate.