President Trump reversed a Biden-era decision that had established the advancement of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) principles as part of the criteria for promotion within the foreign service.
A March 18 memo implementing the reversal built on an executive order that Trump signed on his first day in office to eliminate DEI-related offices and initiatives from the federal bureaucracy. In a post to X, the White House referred to the document as “an official memorandum removing racial DEI from the foreign service.”
The memo revised the foreign service’s criteria for tenure and promotion document, which was issued for the period from 2022 through 2025 to “remove any reference to the Core Precept entitled ‘Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility.’”
The foreign service precepts document stated that mid-level State Department employees are expected to “[advance] diversity, equity, and inclusion in words and actions.” National Review was first to report on State’s move to issue the DEI-oriented precepts document. The document also said that foreign service officers must recognize “that unconscious biases can affect decisions and actions” and that they must take “steps to identify and mitigate them in the evaluation of others’ performance.” The precepts document went on to apply similar standards to employees at all levels in the foreign service.
A White House fact sheet explaining the March 18 memo characterized the DEI-advancement precepts as a “DEI loyalty test.” It also quoted Gina Abercrombie-Winstanley, who served as State’s chief diversity and inclusion officer in the Biden administration: “We made the change that if you wanted to be considered for promotion at the Department of State, you must be able to document what you are doing to support diversity, equity and inclusion and accessibility.”
Overall, the White House said, its moves to cut DEI from foreign policy are about “serving America, not ideological agendas.”
“This divisive and discriminatory practice has no place in our country or our diplomacy,” Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in a statement posted to X on the rescission of the DEI promotion criteria. “We are restoring meritocracy in everything the @StateDept does.” In 2023, Rubio led legislation in the Senate that would have eliminated the DEI core precept.
Upon arriving at Foggy Bottom in January, Rubio moved swiftly to end the Biden administration’s efforts to instill U.S. diplomacy with a focus on DEI initiatives and other left-wing social programs. The State Department took down social media accounts associated with offices dedicated to DEI and racial equity, indicating that the Trump administration is eliminating those roles.
“The Foreign Service includes thousands of Americans dedicated to protecting the United States both at home and around the world,” Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Jim Risch said in a statement on March 20. “For too long, discriminatory hiring practices based on ‘DEIA’ have prevented the Foreign Service from operating at peak performance. President Trump’s executive order removes these illegal distractions while getting the State Department back to doing what it does best, effectively advancing America’s interests abroad.”