Rollback: Walmart abandons DEI and other ‘woke’ policies

BREAKING! In a seismic shift that will send shockwaves throughout corporate America, retail giant Walmart said on Monday that it will roll back a number of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) policies — joining a growing list of brands to do so.

Walmart’s decision to scale back its DEI initiatives follows a post on X by filmmaker-turned-conservative-activist Robby Starbuck, who publicly disclosed the changes ahead of a Bloomberg report.

Starbuck revealed that he had contacted Walmart last week to discuss a story he was planning to write about the company’s “wokeness” policies, but the conversation evolved into a productive dialogue about DEI, including common-sense solutions to problems of equity and fairness.

A Walmart spokesperson confirmed the report. “We are willing to change alongside our associates and customers who represent all of America,” the spokesperson said.

Among the changes Walmart executives have committed to is an end to participation in the Corporate Equality Index (CEI). As I wrote in a blog post last year, the CEI is a social credit system enforced by the Human Rights Campaign (HRC), the world’s largest LGBTQ+ political lobbying group, that rewards or punishes companies based on its own ratings criteria for “inclusiveness.”

CEI is part of the now-infamous ESG (Environmental, Social and Corporate Governance) “ethical investing” movement pushed by the country’s top three investment firms.

In addition, the world’s largest retailer pledges to scale back racial equity training and put an end to considering race and gender to boost diversity when granting supplier contracts.

From Starbuck’s post:

Here are the changes Walmart committed to:

• Surveys: Walmart will no longer participate in the HRC’s woke Corporate Equality Index.

• Products: Monitor the Walmart marketplace to identify and remove inappropriate sexual and / or transgender products marketed to children.

• Funding of Grants: Review all funding of Pride, and other events, to avoid funding inappropriate sexualized content targeting kids.

• Equity: We will not extend the Racial Equity Center which was established in 2020 as a special five-year initiative.

• Supplier Diversity: We will evaluate supplier diversity programs and ensure they do not provide preferential treatment and benefits to suppliers based on diversity. We don’t have quotas and won’t going forward. Financing eligibility will no longer be predicated on providing certain demographic data.

• LatinX: Walmart will no longer use the term in official communications.

• Trainings: Walmart will discontinue racial equity training through the Racial Equity Institute.

• DEI: Walmart will discontinue the use of DEI as a term while ensuring a respectful and supportive environment. Our focus is on Belonging for ALL associates and customers.

Starbuck’s post continues:

We’ve now changed policy at companies worth over $2 Trillion dollars, with many millions of employees who have better workplace environments as a result. I’m happy to have secured these changes before Christmas when shoppers have very few large retail brands they can spend money with who aren’t pushing woke policies. Companies like Amazon and Target should be very nervous that their top competitor dropped woke policies first. I think Target specifically will suffer serious sales problems as a result and Walmart will benefit.

Our campaigns are now so effective that we’re getting the biggest companies on earth to change their policies without me even posting a story outlining their woke policies. Companies can clearly see that America wants normalcy back. The era of wokeness is dying right in front of our eyes. The landscape of corporate America is quickly shifting to sanity and neutrality. We are now the trend, not the anomaly.

We are winning and one by one we WILL bring sanity back to corporate America.

With this move, Walmart joins companies such as Tractor Supply Company, John Deere, Harley Davidson, Polaris, Lowe’s, Ford, Coors, Starbucks, Stanley Black & Decker, Jack Daniels, DeWalt, Craftsman, Caterpillar, Boeing, and Toyota, all of which have modified their DEI policies over the past year.

Starbuck has a history of investigating and challenging companies about their employment practices.

Predictably, left-wing mouthpieces and mainstream media outlets (but I repeat myself) are demonizing Starbuck with headlines such as “Walmart rolls back DEI programs after right-wing backlash” (CNN). What these propagandists fail to acknowledge is that many of the changes Walmart plans have been in the works for years. For example, Walmart had already dropped the term “DEI” from its lexicon in favor of “belonging” and made changes to its supplier diversity program.

Even in the wake of the 2024 U.S. presidential election, The Establishment still does not understand that the winds of change have shifted. After decades of political correctness and well-intentioned, but ultimately extreme, social justice activism have resulted in — for example — the gross overrepresentation of black actors in TV commercials and anti-white hiring practices, the public has had enough.

Walmart’s move will be an inflection point. As more and more companies realize that their primary focus should be on providing quality products and services at reasonable prices, Americans can expect to see further rollbacks of excessive DEI policies.

It’s still early days, but the era of woke appears to be coming to an end. The public is ready to embrace a new era of common sense and individual merit. Let’s see how it goes.

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