The Department of Justice has opened an investigation into the University of Virginia for discriminating against students based on the illiberal principles of diversity, equity, and inclusion.
The DOJ confirmed to America First Legal on Thursday that it’s launched an investigation into how UVA “is actively operating programs that discriminate based on race, sex, ethnicity, national origin, and other impermissible, immutable characteristics,” according to AFL.
The school has allegedly been discriminating based on DEI despite a Supreme Court ruling against affirmative action and an executive order from President Donald Trump banning race-based college admissions.
For three years, AFL has fought relentlessly to dismantle DEI.
This week, President Trump issued an executive order ending illegal discrimination and restoring merit-based opportunity for all Americans.
This marks the beginning of the end of DEI. pic.twitter.com/nNZjsBWDIF
— America First Legal (@America1stLegal) January 22, 2025
But according to AFL counsel Megan Redshaw, it’s not so much that the university has been blatantly continuing its DEI practices in the face of these rulings as it that the school has covertly rebranded all of its discriminatory programs in an attempt to appear DEI-free.
“UVA has not dismantled its DEI framework — it has merely rebranded it to evade legal scrutiny,” Redshaw explained in a statement.
“What the law prohibits, UVA simply renamed,” she added.
The DOJ’s decision to launch an investigation was reportedly prompted by a letter sent by AFL to the department earlier in the month, detailing numerous examples of this rebranding.
The letter noted, for example, that UVA’s Darden School of Business still “retains diversity-focused scholarships, programming, and a Chief Diversity Officer who oversees strategic implementation.”
“Darden also partners with external organizations to offer scholarships that favor students based on impermissible characteristics,” the letter continued.
Meanwhile, the school retained many DEI-linked positions but just renamed them.
Take the “Associate Director of Global Diversity, Equity and Inclusion,” for example. The position was simply renamed to “Associate Director, Global Recruiting.”
/6 Jannatul Pramanik was UVA’s “Associate Director of Global Diversity, Equity and Inclusion.” After the March 7 vote to dismantle DEI, UVA simply renamed her “Associate Director, Global Recruiting.”
The job? Still DEI.
The networks? Still DEI.
⁰The mission? Still DEI. pic.twitter.com/3BzFQaEymk— America First Legal (@America1stLegal) May 24, 2025
The March 7 vote mentioned in the AFL tweet above referenced a decision by UVA’s Board of Visitors to dissolve the school’s DEI office.
“The administration will review the functions of the office, and all personnel and programs that are permissible under state and federal law will be transferred within the University, within 30 days,” the school said at the time, as reported by UVA Magazine.
The letter written by AFL to the DOJ noted that despite the vote, “there is no public indication UVA responded to the Board of Visitors within the 30-day window, raising questions about the University’s noncompliance and transparency.”
DEI is an illiberal philosophy that seeks to make up for past discrimination against certain races/groups by applying modern discrimination against everybody else.
One of the most notorious forms of DEI is affirmative action, which calls for purposefully discriminating against Asian and white students to artificially prop up black and Latino students.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
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