Walmart rolls back DEI policies

Editor’s note: A previous version of this story misspelled the last name of Walmart CEO Doug McMillon.

Walmart is set to roll back diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) policies nationwide, according to conservative activist Robby Starbuck, who said the company changed direction after talks last week.

“MASSIVE news: Walmart is ending their woke policies. I can now exclusively tell you what’s changing and how it happened,” Starbuck wrote Monday on the social platform X. 

“Last week I told execs at @Walmart that I was doing a story on wokeness there. Instead we had productive conversations to find solutions,” he added.

Starbuck said the company will discontinue the use of the terms DEI and “LatinX” while discontinuing training through the Racial Equity Institute and terminating its Racial Equity Center, which was established in 2020 as a special five-year initiative.

In regards to supplier diversity, the corporation has committed to reevaluating its programs to ensure they do not provide preferential treatment and benefits to suppliers based on diversity, according to the activist.

Walmart Inc. sourced more than $13.1 billion in goods and services from diverse suppliers in 2020, it said, after protests broke out across the country in the wake of the death of George Floyd, who was murdered by a police officer.

“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,” Starbuck continued in his post.

“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,” he wrote.

The activist also noted Walmart will remove sexual and transgender-related products marketed to children and agreed to no longer participate in the Human Rights Campaign’s Corporate Equality Index, which evaluates corporate policies related to LGBTQ employees. 

He predicted the company’s competitors including Target and Amazon would “suffer” as a result of the shift. 

Over the past few months, Starbuck has advocated for John Deere, Harley Davidson, Lowe’s and Ford among others to move away from “wokeness.”

“We’ve been on a journey and know we aren’t perfect, but every decision comes from a place of wanting to foster a sense of belonging, to open doors to opportunities for all our associates, customers and suppliers and to be a Walmart for everyone,” Walmart told The Hill in a statement.

The company’s CEO Doug McMillon said the corporation would focus on supporting small businesses.

“Every year we really focus on made in the USA, about two thirds of what we sell is either made, grown or assembled right here in the United States,” he said during an appearance on “CBS Mornings” highlighted by Grabien. “We have a program every summer called open call where we welcome in small suppliers and we welcome in people that have an idea, that are an entrepreneur, and they want to learn. So we’re going to continue to lean into ensuring that we provide the very best pathways for small businesses, our suppliers, to be successful here in the store.”

Updated at 5 p.m. EST.