In a bold move, the University of Florida shuts down its Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion office, following the recently approved bill by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R).
During its previous budget allocation, DEI initiatives on the campus received $5 million. However, the university announced they will re-channel the funds to faculty recruitment.
DeSantis lauded the law and wrote on X, “DEI is toxic and has no place in our public universities. I’m glad that Florida was the first state to eliminate DEI and I hope more states follow suit.”
The Board of Governors defines DEI as “any program, campus activity, or policy that classifies individuals based on race, color, sex, national origin, gender identity, or sexual orientation and promotes differential or preferential treatment of individuals based on such classification.”
With this, U of Florida becomes the first state college to dismiss all DEI staff.
In July, the university was accused of blatantly lying to the Florida governor by underreporting their DEI efforts to “conceal the radicalism in the campus.”
The law was also touted by conservative activists, including Christopher Rufo, who wrote on X, “The conservative counter-revolution has begun.”
Rufo, who was also DeSantis’ education appointee, previously exposed that the university was “lying through their teeth to the governor” when they claimed they were supporting merely 20 DEI programs.
Rufo said that the university had operated 1,000 DEI initiatives.
“I’ve discovered through public records requests and the threat of litigation, that the University of Florida, which is under the purview of a Red state legislature, explicitly lied to the governor, in its official response to his request about their DEI programs.”
“But I’ve discovered through these bombshell documents that they, in fact, had more than 1,000 separate DEI programs embedded in every facet of the university’s programs and administration,” he added.
U of Florida further said in their memo that employees will receive twelve weeks of pay and are encouraged to apply for new jobs at the school.
“HR will work to fast-track the interview process and provide an answer on all applications within the twelve-week window,” according to an internal memo sent by the university.
Additionally, “The Office of the Chief Financial Officer will reallocate the approximately $5 million in funds,” previously used for DEI-related expenses, “into a faculty recruitment fund to be administered by the Office of the Provost.”
University officials sacked 13 staff jobs and removed administrative appointments of 15 faculty staff to the diversity office.
Aside from Florida, Texas also approved a DEI bill recently, while other GOP-led states moved to approve around 50 anti-DEI legislation this year.
