Somewhere, "1984" author George Orwell is smiling. War is peace. Freedom is slavery. And on MSNBC this morning: discrimination creates a "level playing field."
On Wednesday's edition of MSNBC's Way Too Early, host Ali Vitali invited Lauren Leader to discuss the vote by Apple shareholders not to abandon the company's DEI programs.
As Leader's home page describes her [emphasis added]:
Lauren is also founder of a boutique consulting firm that works with a wide array of institutions and leaders both in business and politics to advance diversity and equality. She has served dozens of major companies and institutions in that capacity.
So Leader literally makes her living by promoting DEI in corporate America and politics. No surprise then that she was pleased by the decision by Apple shareholders to retain DEI policies.
Leader went Orwellian when at the end of the segment she said:
"Diversity is what this country was built on. And most Americans do understand that it should be a level playing field for all."
Equality of opportunity? By all means. But the "E" in DEI isn't "Equality." It stands for "Equity." In other words, not equal opportunity. Equal outcomes.
And how are those equal outcomes achieved? By choosing less qualified people based on their race and sex while rejecting more qualified people who don't check the right boxes. In other words, by blatant discrimination.
Vitali was all in on Leader's pro-discrimination approach. She praised Leader for "tug[ging] on a really important thread when you make the case that Apple is responsive to what its consumers want. The more range of lived experience that you have sitting at the table means that more people are going to be able to have positive interactions with their product."
You know what most people consider "positive interactions" with products? Having products like computers and planes that don't crash. Who cares about the color or sex of the people building them? Just make the darn things work!
And then there was Leader's claim that our country was "built on diversity." America was built on the foundation of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. The authors were all people of pallor. What's worse, their gender at birth had uniformly been assigned as male!
Leader has made numerous MSNBC appearances, always hewing to the liberal line. In 2023, our Nicholas Fondacaro caught Leader accusing Nikki Haley of being a race traitor by supposedly playing to Republican biases. And, as Fondacaro pointed out, Leader "brazenly lied" in claiming that Tim Scott claims that he has never been a victim of racism.
In 2018, I noted Leader encouraging military leaders to disobey orders from the Commander-in-Chief, Donald Trump.
Here's the transcript.
MSNBC
Way Too Early
2/26/25
5:56 am ETALI VITALI: Joining us now, co-founder and CEO of All In Together, Lauren Leader. Lauren, so what do you make of Apple shareholders' decision to kind of swim against the current here and keep their diversity and inclusion programs?
LAUREN LEADER: Well, look, I think for companies that are consumer-facing like Apple, diversity and inclusion is really mission critical. Because it's about how they build products and services that are responsive to the marketplace, which is, in their case, the whole world.
So I think, you know, Apple's been very clear that they were not interested in you know, outside pressure on this, and that they were going to prioritize their shareholders and prioritize the business itself.
VITALI: I also think you tug on a really important thread there when you make the case that Apple is responsive to what its consumers want. The more range of lived experience that you have sitting at the table means that more people are going to be able to have positive interactions with their product.
That also applies in the political space. You and I talk about this so much, so often, that diversity of people who are running and taking up space in office means that policy is just better for a larger swath of the American public.
So if you're a consumer or if you're a politic-minded person, how can you be thinking about these DEI moves by the administration, versus what actually would be borne out if you had more diverse people taking up these spaces?
LEADER: Right. In business and democracy and government and everywhere. I mean, I think, and look, all the polls show that the vast majority of Americans really understand this. I mean, diversity is what this country was built on.
And most Americans do understand that it should be a level playing field for all.