DEI

When Zohran Mamdani applied to Columbia University in 2009, he checked both the “Asian” and “Black or African American” boxes on his admissions form. He wasn’t lying – technically. Born in Uganda to Indian parents, Mamdani said he was trying to express his complex heritage. But in a recent interview with The New York Times, he admitted something telling: he doesn’t consider himself black.That admission, buried beneath the usual progressive buzzwords about “nuance” and “complexity,” should be a wake-up call for anyone still defending race-based admissions in elite education. Mamdani didn’t cheat the system. He played by its rules. And that’s exactly the problem.

Congratulations David Hogg: the youngest ever DNC vice chair has earned the honor of serving the shortest term in the committee's history. Though his tenure was brief, Hogg managed to rattle many cages. After his election, the 25-year-old announced a $20 million plan to primary older Democratic incumbents in safe seats running for reelection. This plan quickly generated backlash within the party: veteran Democratic strategist James Carville called it "the most insane thing" he's ever heard. Hogg stood his ground and suddenly the DNC deployed its Diversity, Equity and Inclusion requirements. That included one more woman and one fewer Hogg. Cue various facile jokes about his name: https://twitter.com/rachelmillman/status/1933214625442787772?

The Supreme Court’s recent decision in Ames v. Ohio Department of Youth Services didn’t dominate the headlines – but it should have. In a unanimous ruling, the Court quietly dismantled a legal fiction that has distorted civil rights law for decades. And in a twist no one saw coming, the opinion was authored by Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, the progressive icon of the bench. At the heart of Ames was a question few Americans knew they needed to ask: can equality before the law coexist with unequal legal standards? “In 2019, Ames – a straight, white woman – interviewed and was passed over for a newly created management role, which was instead awarded to a lesbian.

If one were looking for dismal assessments of the Trump administration’s contributions to the vitality of American intellectual inquiry, the editorial eructations of Holden Thorp would likely be at the top of the list.   Thorp is the editor-in-chief of Science, the weekly journal of American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). This makes him one of the most influential figures in the academy and in American science as a whole. Few weeks go by without an editorial from Thorp denouncing the havoc wrought by Trump. The May 8 issue is mildly titled, “The New Reality for American Academe,” but the mildness ends there.

Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DoGE) continues merrily to chop programs and departments left, right and center. Federal diversity, equity and inclusion officials were suspended on his first day in office, prior to being given their marching orders. Government employees have been ordered to justify their existence by explaining what, if anything, they achieved last week. All of this ought to be a positive influence on how the US is governed. Some will claim it to be an ideological war waged by the Trump administration. Yet it is really just the same process that private corporations undergo constantly in their search for greater efficiency and profits. Yet there is a chink in Trump’s strategy.

Firefighters do not run into a blaze like you see on TV. We crawl with purpose like rats in a maze, which is what a well-involved structure fire feels like, the smoke so thick our high-powered flashlights can’t cut through it. We are trained to locate windows and leave furniture in place as reference points while we conduct search and rescue then scurry to the nearest walls. It makes it all the more vital to have another firefighter with you. The fire was consuming a construction site on Yale’s campus. “The security guard’s inside.” The water company hadn’t arrived yet. No matter, we were going in. I ordered the firefighter to grab the forcible entry saw. He didn’t know where it was. Precious seconds gone.

For the past several years, the air traffic I see out the windows of my office has been constant — a regularly occurring string of flights headed north up the Potomac toward Ronald Reagan International Airport, and others headed south after taking off. Yesterday morning was the first time I can remember seeing the skies utterly clear of traffic, as the ferry boats that normally take tourists and visitors from port to port along the river were instead repurposed as salvage vehicles for divers seeking out the remains of the passengers lost in the crash of American Eagle Flight 5342 and soldiers flying the Army Black Hawk it collided with a mere 400 feet above the water.

President Donald Trump is making quick work of his first week in office, signing a flurry of executive orders on everything ranging from the southern border to abolishing diversity, equity and inclusion, or DEI, programs for much of the federal workforce.Starting this week, Trump wants “radical and wasteful” DEI offices to be placed on paid leave, according to a memo issued by the Office of Personnel Management. “President Trump campaigned on ending the scourge of DEI from our federal government and returning America to a merit-based society,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said of the move.

The newly sworn-in President Trump had a busy inaugural day. Between swearing into office and waving a saber around while dancing to “YMCA” at an inaugural ball, he also signed several executive orders and proclamations. After signing his cabinet and other nominations, President Trump’s first order of business was to proclaim that all flags should be flown at full staff for this and all future inauguration days. Following the inaugural parade, President Trump signed a bevy of additional executive documents as thousands of his supporters cheered.

President-elect Donald Trump’s pick to lead the Pentagon, military veteran and former Fox News personality Pete Hegseth, had his first hearing in front of the Senate Armed Services Committee Tuesday. In his opening remarks, the author of The War on Warriors admitted that he is an unorthodox pick. “It is true that I don’t have a similar biography to defense secretaries of the last thirty years. But, as President Trump also told me, we’ve repeatedly placed people atop the Pentagon with supposedly ‘the right credentials’  — whether they are retired generals, academics or defense contractor executives — and where has it gotten us?” his opening statement read. “It’s time to give someone with dust on his boots the helm.