While watching the PBS Newshour, there was a segment about a recent focus group conducted by Republican strategist Sarah Longwell. The people in the survey were long time Democratic voters who voted for Donald Trump this past election. This is what two of them had to say about Diversity, Equity and Inclusion.
Steve, Trump Voter: I don’t want like to be hired just because I’m Black. I want to get hired because I deserve the job. At the same time, I can understand why in certain career fields or certain industries, there might be a need for more inclusion of diversity. But I’m not for including that diversity at the risk of having quality workers.
Brian, Trump Voter: When you’re talking about government places like fire department, when you’re talking about things that are there to save lives, right, you want the best of the best, right? I want the best firepower. Of all the firefighters, I want the top ones if I’m going to be safe.
As someone who’s been in the communication business for most of my life, I know that people will believe a lie if they hear it repeated constantly. Here’s an example of a Black voter and a white voter both believing that competence and equity are mutually exclusive.
Yet, somehow in sports, those beliefs of leveling the playing field are widely accepted. This past Super Bowl, we saw two Black quarterbacks playing on the world’s biggest stage. In 2025, the acceptance of a Black quarterback is commonplace.
That wasn’t the case, however, nearly 40 years ago when Vice President and General Manager of the Los Angeles Dodgers, Al Campanis, tried to explain to Ted Koppel on ABC Nightline why there weren’t any Black managers, general managers or owners in baseball. The segment was in recognition of Jackie Robinson’s first game in major league baseball. Campanis was a former teammate and roommate of Robinson’s when the two played for the Brooklyn Dodgers farm team–the Montreal Royals.
CAMPANIS: No, I don’t believe it’s prejudice. I truly believe that they may not have some of the necessities to be, let’s say, a field manager or perhaps a general manager.
KOPPEL: Do you really believe that?
CAMPANIS: Well, I don’t say that all of them, but they certainly are short. How many quarterbacks do you have? How many pitchers do you have that are Black?
Back then, quarterbacks and pitchers were thought of as positions of intelligence over athleticism. We now know they can be both.
As a television reporter working in smaller markets, I learned that my co-workers who said and did things that might be interpreted as racist, weren’t necessarily racist. Rather, they were a product of their environment. Consequently, it was incumbent upon me to say something in a manner that wouldn’t put them on the defensive, but allow them to see the error of their ways.
That’s the intent of DEI or affirmative action policies–to intentionally repair the harm institutional racism continues to do to Black people in America in every aspect of our lives–underfunded schools, food deserts, medicine deserts, access to mortgages and business loans, entry into college or the trades, job opportunities, career promotions and the list goes on and on. Unfortunately, racism is so steeped into the DNA of America that any progress made by a Black person is seen as a threat to white superiority.
DEI or affirmative action policies didn’t just benefit Black people. A 5′ 7″ white man can go into law enforcement because of affirmative action. A white woman can be a firefighter or a helicopter fighter pilot because of affirmative action. In fact, white women are the biggest beneficiaries of these programs, which expand on the 1964 Civil Rights Act that Black people fought and died to get signed into law. Also, LGBTQ+ people, infertile couples, disabled people and veterans all have benefited.
Interestingly, the Republicans call these values, “woke” or “personality politics.” I first started hearing these terms during the 2016 Hillary Clinton Presidential Campaign. No one had a problem when it was all white men benefiting from the “good ol’ boy network.” That wasn’t “personality politics.” Instead, it was a “meritocracy,” because all white men are so exceptional.
As Michael Eric Dyson recently said on WTTW’s Black Voices, “I think Black people and others have to practice DEI, too: Deny Economic Investment.” The growing list of companies that have abandoned their DEI programs say they are responding to their “conservative activist” customers.
Organizing 101 teaches that power comes from two sources: organized people and organized money. According to the faith-based, grassroots organizing group, Gamaliel, “Organized people work together toward a common goal because they have a shared self-interest in the success of that goal.”
During apartheid in South Africa, there was a call for Black people and others to boycott companies that continued to do business under the government’s racist regime. Currently, there’s a similar call to action. Supporters of DEI initiatives are being asked to demonstrate our collective economic power with a 24-hour Blackout of our dollars starting at midnight Friday, Feb. 28 until 11:59 p.m.
ACTIONS:
• Do not make any purchases.
• Do not shop online or in stores.
• Do not buy fast food, gasoline, patronize major retailers, use your credit or debit cards for nonessential spending.
• If needed, only buy absolute essentials such as food, medicine and emergency supplies.
• If you must spend, only support small, local and Black-owned businesses.
Here is a list of companies that have removed some—or all—references to diversity, equity and inclusion from their annual reports: Pepsi, General Motors, Google, Disney, General Electric Co., Intel, PayPal, Chipotle, Comcast, Accenture, Amazon, Amtrak, The Smithsonian Institution, Target, Meta, McDonald’s, Walmart, Boeing, Molson Coors, Lowe’s, Ford Motor Company, Jack Daniels, Harley Davidson and John Deere.
Here are the companies refusing to abandon their DEI policies: Costco, Delta Airlines, Cisco, Deutsche Bank, JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America, Nasdaq and the NFL, which said in a statement, “We’re not in this because it’s a trend to get into it or a trend to get out of it.”
Of course, this list also should include Tesla, the electric vehicle company owned by Elon Musk. The South African-born Musk was the recipient of a $465 million loan from President Barack Obama’s administration. Currently, it’s reported he has 32 federal contracts that pay him $8 million a day in taxpayer money.
Like Trump, who got a small loan of $1 million from his father to start a real estate business, Musk is the son of a wealthy engineer. Both are the beneficiaries of white privilege–something many of the president’s supporters railing against DEI will never enjoy.
As Republicans have discovered, DEI makes for a good boogeyman–because it feeds into the racist image of the lazy, shiftless and incompetent Black person. Annually, Black people spend $1.3 trillion in America. It’s time to Deny that Economic Investment into those businesses that believe DEI is a handout and not a hand up.
Deny Economic Investment
While watching the PBS Newshour, there was a segment about a recent focus group conducted by Republican strategist Sarah Longwell. The people in the survey were long time Democratic voters who voted for Donald Trump this past election. This is what two of them had to say about Diversity, Equity and Inclusion.
Steve, Trump Voter: I don’t want like to be hired just because I’m Black. I want to get hired because I deserve the job. At the same time, I can understand why in certain career fields or certain industries, there might be a need for more inclusion of diversity. But I’m not for including that diversity at the risk of having quality workers.
Brian, Trump Voter: When you’re talking about government places like fire department, when you’re talking about things that are there to save lives, right, you want the best of the best, right? I want the best firepower. Of all the firefighters, I want the top ones if I’m going to be safe.
As someone who’s been in the communication business for most of my life, I know that people will believe a lie if they hear it repeated constantly. Here’s an example of a Black voter and a white voter both believing that competence and equity are mutually exclusive.
Yet, somehow in sports, those beliefs of leveling the playing field are widely accepted. This past Super Bowl, we saw two Black quarterbacks playing on the world’s biggest stage. In 2025, the acceptance of a Black quarterback is commonplace.
That wasn’t the case, however, nearly 40 years ago when Vice President and General Manager of the Los Angeles Dodgers, Al Campanis, tried to explain to Ted Koppel on ABC Nightline why there weren’t any Black managers, general managers or owners in baseball. The segment was in recognition of Jackie Robinson’s first game in major league baseball. Campanis was a former teammate and roommate of Robinson’s when the two played for the Brooklyn Dodgers farm team–the Montreal Royals.
CAMPANIS: No, I don’t believe it’s prejudice. I truly believe that they may not have some of the necessities to be, let’s say, a field manager or perhaps a general manager.
KOPPEL: Do you really believe that?
CAMPANIS: Well, I don’t say that all of them, but they certainly are short. How many quarterbacks do you have? How many pitchers do you have that are Black?
Back then, quarterbacks and pitchers were thought of as positions of intelligence over athleticism. We now know they can be both.
As a television reporter working in smaller markets, I learned that my co-workers who said and did things that might be interpreted as racist, weren’t necessarily racist. Rather, they were a product of their environment. Consequently, it was incumbent upon me to say something in a manner that wouldn’t put them on the defensive, but allow them to see the error of their ways.
That’s the intent of DEI or affirmative action policies–to intentionally repair the harm institutional racism continues to do to Black people in America in every aspect of our lives–underfunded schools, food deserts, medicine deserts, access to mortgages and business loans, entry into college or the trades, job opportunities, career promotions and the list goes on and on. Unfortunately, racism is so steeped into the DNA of America that any progress made by a Black person is seen as a threat to white superiority.
DEI or affirmative action policies didn’t just benefit Black people. A 5′ 7″ white man can go into law enforcement because of affirmative action. A white woman can be a firefighter or a helicopter fighter pilot because of affirmative action. In fact, white women are the biggest beneficiaries of these programs, which expand on the 1964 Civil Rights Act that Black people fought and died to get signed into law. Also, LGBTQ+ people, infertile couples, disabled people and veterans all have benefited.
Interestingly, the Republicans call these values, “woke” or “personality politics.” I first started hearing these terms during the 2016 Hillary Clinton Presidential Campaign. No one had a problem when it was all white men benefiting from the “good ol’ boy network.” That wasn’t “personality politics.” Instead, it was a “meritocracy,” because all white men are so exceptional.
As Michael Eric Dyson recently said on WTTW’s Black Voices, “I think Black people and others have to practice DEI, too: Deny Economic Investment.” The growing list of companies that have abandoned their DEI programs say they are responding to their “conservative activist” customers.
Organizing 101 teaches that power comes from two sources: organized people and organized money. According to the faith-based, grassroots organizing group, Gamaliel, “Organized people work together toward a common goal because they have a shared self-interest in the success of that goal.”
During apartheid in South Africa, there was a call for Black people and others to boycott companies that continued to do business under the government’s racist regime. Currently, there’s a similar call to action. Supporters of DEI initiatives are being asked to demonstrate our collective economic power with a 24-hour Blackout of our dollars starting at midnight Friday, Feb. 28 until 11:59 p.m.
ACTIONS:
• Do not make any purchases.
• Do not shop online or in stores.
• Do not buy fast food, gasoline, patronize major retailers, use your credit or debit cards for nonessential spending.
• If needed, only buy absolute essentials such as food, medicine and emergency supplies.
• If you must spend, only support small, local and Black-owned businesses.
Here is a list of companies that have removed some—or all—references to diversity, equity and inclusion from their annual reports: Pepsi, General Motors, Google, Disney, General Electric Co., Intel, PayPal, Chipotle, Comcast, Accenture, Amazon, Amtrak, The Smithsonian Institution, Target, Meta, McDonald’s, Walmart, Boeing, Molson Coors, Lowe’s, Ford Motor Company, Jack Daniels, Harley Davidson and John Deere.
Here are the companies refusing to abandon their DEI policies: Costco, Delta Airlines, Cisco, Deutsche Bank, JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America, Nasdaq and the NFL, which said in a statement, “We’re not in this because it’s a trend to get into it or a trend to get out of it.”
Of course, this list also should include Tesla, the electric vehicle company owned by Elon Musk. The South African-born Musk was the recipient of a $465 million loan from President Barack Obama’s administration. Currently, it’s reported he has 32 federal contracts that pay him $8 million a day in taxpayer money.
Like Trump, who got a small loan of $1 million from his father to start a real estate business, Musk is the son of a wealthy engineer. Both are the beneficiaries of white privilege–something many of the president’s supporters railing against DEI will never enjoy.
As Republicans have discovered, DEI makes for a good boogeyman–because it feeds into the racist image of the lazy, shiftless and incompetent Black person. Annually, Black people spend $1.3 trillion in America. It’s time to Deny that Economic Investment into those businesses that believe DEI is a handout and not a hand up.