The usual narrative in the legacy media is that women and minorities will be hardest hit by … anything, up to and including climate change. That's why it's unusual to see CNN concerned about rural poor communities. The cable news network doesn't usually concern itself with rural communities — maybe it's because we have a vice president from a poor rural community — so we're curious how gutting DEI is going to affect them in particular.
The latest entry in the media's mass guilt strategy. pic.twitter.com/pedZ24MHy6
— Stephen L. Miller (@redsteeze) January 26, 2025
Rachel Ramirez reports:
Just hours after his swearing-in this week, as a raft of executive orders was presented and signed at the Resolute Desk in the Oval Office, President Donald Trump authorized action to end “radical and wasteful government DEI programs and preferencing.”
Employees in federal positions overseeing Diversity, Equity and Inclusion initiatives were put on paid leave as officials were ordered to “coordinate the termination of all discriminatory programs, including illegal DEI and ‘diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility’ (DEIA) mandates, policies, programs, preferences, and activities in the Federal Government, under whatever name they appear.”
Trump’s billionaire adviser Elon Musk has derided DEI initiatives as “racism” and opponents say they take opportunities away from White Americans.
But Trump’s Monday order also took aim at “environmental justice” — eliminating positions and assessing spending on projects, including those aimed at poor, rural communities.
So it's not the gutting of DEI programs at all, but "environmental justice."
The endangerment of these projects under the new administration was “not unexpected,” said Jalonne White-Newsome, former federal chief environmental justice officer at the White House Council on Environmental Quality — a position created under the Biden administration.
Former federal chief environmental justice officer? That doesn't sound like a position that is a priority that needs to be filled.
Indeed, what has ever had more direct and effective impact on rural, poor communities than federal DEI programs stacked with elite degree-holders making six figures giving large grants to dubious lefty non-profits stacked with the same? https://t.co/g2yssvFFCw
— Mary Katharine Ham (@mkhammer) January 27, 2025
Like the Democrats have ever given one single crap about rural communities.
— Spock The Ripper (More Equal Animals) (@CrimsonPKing) January 27, 2025
When I'm hanging out at a team roping with my cowboy church friends, all the talk centers around DEI programs and never the cost of hay, fertilizer and diesel.
— Vin Tanner (@VinTanner417682) January 27, 2025
Not when we move some large federal offices to rural communities
— Support Lawfare against Deep State (@DennisDeeUSA123) January 27, 2025
Remember back in 2019 when federal workers turned their backs on Trump's agriculture secretary after he chose to relocate them from D.C. to Kansas City?
Case in point. pic.twitter.com/YnfxEnuS6z
— James Treakle-Smith (@DirectorJTS) January 27, 2025
Yeah, let me tell you, my working class family in rural Illinois is REALLY gonna suffer over this one...oh wait, they were Trump voters in the middle of the country. They're the people the media can't be bothered to talk to. They're gonna be just fine ya mopes
— yellowsv650 (@YellowSv650) January 27, 2025
This is the "meteor coming that will end all life on earth, women and minorities hit worst" story.
— Mr. BocMonster (@bocmonster) January 27, 2025
Poor, rural communities could care less about DEI. They care about results.
— J-HawkNSC (@JayhawknTN) January 27, 2025
Until the poors are able to understand the value of DEI programs they will remain poor.
— Stuck (@StuckInMiddleU) January 27, 2025
What my friends in western NC really need right now, more than anything, is a robust DEI bureaucracy
— dancaid⚙️👾 (@dancaid) January 27, 2025
So the headline's a complete fake-out anyway, just as we knew it was. There's nothing in that story about the gutting of DEI hitting rural poor communities.
Remember when President Joe Biden give $42.5 billion to the Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) program to provide under-served and rural areas with internet access? So far, it has connected nobody.
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