US’ largest retailer Walmart is rolling back its diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives, reported the Associated Press on Monday.
The company confirmed that it would discontinue a $100 million racial equity initiative launched in 2020 following the murder of George Floyd.
It will also step back from participating in a prominent LGBTQ+ workplace inclusion index and remove race and gender considerations from its supplier diversity program.
The developments place Walmart at the center of a growing national narrative over DEI policies in the workplace.
Walmart’s decision comes amid a broader assumption over the role of DEI in US corporations in the wake of the Supreme Court’s landmark June ruling ending affirmative action in college admissions.
That decision has fueled legal challenges to workplace diversity programs, with conservative groups asserting that such initiatives amount to reverse discrimination.
“This is the biggest win yet for our movement to end wokeness in corporate America,” Robby Starbuck, a conservative activist, declared on the social media platform X, formerly Twitter.
Starbucks, which has targeted several corporations over DEI policies, claimed to have talked with Walmart about the rollback.
Walmart defended its decisions in a statement that reflected a broader effort to foster inclusion and “belonging” across its vast workforce of 1.6 million US employees.
“Every decision comes from a place of wanting to foster a sense of belonging, to open doors to opportunities for all our associates, customers, and suppliers, and to be a Walmart for everyone,” the company said.
A Shift in Policy
Walmart confirmed to The Associated Press that it will better monitor its third-party marketplace items to make sure they don’t feature sexual and transgender products aimed at minors. That would include chest binders intended for youth going through a gender change, the company said.
The retailer will also be reviewing grants to Pride events to make sure it is not financially supporting sexualized content that may be unsuitable for kids.
For example, the company wants to ensure that a family pavilion is not next to a drag show at a Pride event.
Additionally, Walmart will no longer consider race and gender as a litmus test to improve diversity when it offers supplier contracts. The company said it didn’t have quotas and will not do so. It won’t be gathering demographic data when determining grant financing eligibility.
Walmart also said it wouldn’t renew a racial equity center that was established through a five-year, $100 million philanthropic commitment from the company with a mandate to, according to its website, “address the root causes of gaps in outcomes experienced by Black and African American people in education, health, finance and criminal justice systems.”
It would also stop participating in the Human Rights Campaign’s annual benchmark index that measures workplace inclusion for LGBTQ+ employees.
“We’ve been on a journey and know we aren’t perfect, but every decision comes from a place of wanting to foster a sense of belonging, to open doors to opportunities for all our associates, customers, and suppliers, and to be a Walmart for everyone,” the company said in a statement.
The changes come soon after an election win by former President Donald Trump, who has criticized DEI initiatives and surrounded himself with conservatives who hold similar views, including his former adviser Stephen Miller, who leads a group called America First Legal that has challenged corporate DEI policies.
Trump named Miller the deputy chief of policy in his new administration.
