Mississippi Senate passes DEI ban, setting up negotiation with House

The Mississippi Senate passed a bill Thursday that would eliminate diversity, equity and inclusion programs from the state’s universities, a priority elevated by Republican President Donald Trump.

Senate Republicans passed the bill with a party line 34-14 vote. The move comes a day after the House advanced a sweeping anti-DEI bill of its own. The move lays the groundwork for negotiations between the House and Senate. The measures passed by each chamber differ in who they would impact, what activities they would regulate and how they aim to reshape the inner workings of the state’s education system.

The Senate bill defines DEI as any effort to influence the composition of the faculty or student body with reference to “race, sex, color, or ethnicity, apart from ensuring colorblind and sex-neutral admissions and hiring in accordance with state and federal anti-discrimination laws.”

It would ban all campus training and programs deemed to violate that definition.

The bill’s prime sponsors, Tyler McCaughn, R-Newton and Nicole Boyd, R-Oxford, have argued the proposed law will clean up inefficiencies in Mississisppi’s higher education system and return the admissions and hiring process to a merit-based system.

“Abolishing DEI policies does not mean we are abandoning diversity,” McCaughn said. “It means that we are refocusing …We’re refocusing on excellence.”

In addition to banning DEI initiatives, Senate Bill 2515, titled the “Requiring Efficiency For Our Colleges And Universities System,” or REFOCUS Act, would create a task force to look for inefficiencies in the state’s higher education system.

The task force would seek to shed light on Mississippi’s lower rate of postsecondary degrees than other states, what can be done to prepare for a declining number of high school graduates attending college and other questions.

Senate Democrats, as their colleagues in the lower chamber argued Wednesday, said DEI programs were created to correct for centuries of discrimination against minorities and women.

“I want you to understand that when we talk about diversity, equity and inclusion, it is not a matter of having unqualified people or you missing an opportunity,” said Democratic Sen. Rod Hickman. “What diversity, equity and inclusion does is it is a mechanism that opens the door for me that your fathers or your grandfathers or somebody down the road opened for you.”

The legislation would impact all of the state’s community colleges and public universities. The House version extends to K-12 schools. The House bill would also bar universities from offering certain courses. The Senate bill has an exemption for scholarly research or creative works.

The House bill contains a provision absent from the Senate version that would force all public schools to teach and promote that there are two genders.

The proposals also differ in how they would be enforced. The Senate bill would direct universities to develop an internal complaint and investigative process for looking into those accused of violating the law. Only students, faculty and contractors would be able to file complaints. The House bill threatens to withhold state funds based on complaints that anyone could lodge. It would empower people to sue schools accused of violating the law.

DEI programs have come under fire mostly from conservatives, who say the programs divide people into categories of victims and oppressors, exacerbate antisemitism and infuse left-wing ideology into campus life. DEI also has progressive critics, who say the programs can be used to feign support for reducing inequality without actually doing so.

But proponents say the programs have been critical to ensuring women and minorities aren’t discriminated against in schools and workplace settings. They argue the programs are necessary to ensure that institutions meet the needs of increasingly diverse student populations.

Trump promised in his 2024 campaign to eliminate DEI in the federal government. One of the first executive orders he signed did that. Some Mississippi lawmakers introduced bills in the 2024 session to restrict DEI, but the proposals never made it out of committee.

The House and Senate now have the ability to take up the other chamber’s proposal as they potentially work toward a final bill.

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This story was originally published by Mississippi Today and distributed through a partnership with The Associated Press.