The Department of the Air Force will no longer set ambitious goals to diversify the officer applicant pool, the latest initiative to be scrapped by the service as a result of President Donald Trump’s executive orders aiming to rid the military of policies he disagrees with.
In 2022, the service set out to update its diversity goals — an aspirational benchmark — to get more applicants to the Air Force Academy and the Reserve Officers’ Training Corps, or ROTC. It marked the first time in a decade that the service had amended those targets. Republicans had pushed back against the program in recent years, claiming it was a left-leaning initiative.
“All [Department of the Air Force] recruitment offices and organizations shall ensure cessation of all [diversity, equity and inclusion, or DEI] recruitment goals and DEI-based outreach plans,” Acting Department of the Air Force Secretary Gary Ashworth wrote in a Jan. 27 memo made public Friday. “Recruitment goals and outreach plans shall be founded in meritocracy.”
Prior to the removal of the program, Military.com reported in December that the Department of the Air Force had not hit the lofty diversity goals it had set for itself in the 2022-2023 and 2023-2024 school years.
The service aimed to have officer applicants be 67.5% white, 13% Black, 10% Asian, 1.5% Native American and Native Alaskan, and 1% Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander, according to the 2022 memo — the remaining 7% was targeted for multi-racial demographics. It also aimed for 15% Hispanic and Latino applicants, as well as 64% men and 36% women.
For the Air Force Academy’s 2023-2024 school year, the applicant pool met the diversity goals for white, male and Hispanic candidates but fell short in all the other categories — Black, Asian, Native American and Native Alaskan, as well as Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander. It also fell short for recruiting women. The 2022-2023 school year had similar demographics.
Air Force ROTC for the 2023-2024 school year made the goals for men as well as Hispanic and Latino applicants, but it missed the other demographic goals, including among white applicants. It was the same result in 2022-2023, though it did make the goals for white applicants.
The memo rescinding the initiative cited Trump’s Jan. 20 executive order titled “Ending Radical and Wasteful Government DEI Programs and Preferencing” as the reason for the reversal.
Air Force officers are concerned about the scrapping of the benchmarks, and fear the message it sends to future recruits.
One female Air Force officer who spoke to Military.com said abandoning efforts to get diverse talent into the ranks — as well as recent Department of Defense efforts to cut programs specifically tailored to women, minorities and others — will likely harm recruitment and quality of life down the road.
“I worry about what this is going to do. How many years is it going to take for us to recover from this?” the officer said. “I worry about what that says for recruitment, because if we’re not bringing new, fresh talent in, we’re not maintaining the talent that we have, and we’re doing nothing to let fresh talent know that they are also wanted, that’s just going to have a ripple effect on all of our services.”
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth made dismantling diversity initiatives within the ranks a top priority within days of being confirmed. Most recently, during a town hall at the Pentagon, he once again underscored his feelings about creating a diverse population in uniform.
“I think the single dumbest phrase in military history is ‘our diversity is our strength,'” Hegseth said. “I think our strength is our unity. Our strength is our shared purpose.”
The Air Force, complying with the Department of Defense, announced late last month in a memo that it will not host official events related to cultural awareness months such as Black History Month or Women’s History Month.
The Air Force has dismantled programs such as Barrier Analysis Working Groups, which advocated for better quality-of-life policies for the rank and file from all walks of life, and rescinded an official handbook used to study for promotion exams as it reviews it for potential diversity material.
Rep. Gil Cisneros, D-Calif., told Military.com in December that, as a former enlisted member of the Navy, he became an officer after completing the Broadened Opportunity for Officer Selection and Training program and applauded the Air Force’s efforts, saying they were helping, not harming, the ranks.
As the former under secretary of defense for personnel and readiness and the Pentagon’s former chief diversity and inclusion officer, Cisneros said he saw the benefits that many programs, like the Air Force’s, had. Cisneros told Military.com in an emailed statement Monday that having more diverse officers encourages many enlisted to also become officers.
“In fact, many people of color who start their military careers as enlisted become some of our most distinguished officers,” Cisneros said. “Diverse officers are an important asset for our military not only for their leadership, but also as figures that enlisted people of color can look up to and aspire to be. It’s unfortunate that Secretary Hegseth and the Air Force don’t see it that way.”
Related: The Air Force’s Faltering Effort to Get More Diversity Among Officers May Be Out of Time