Democratic politicians and potential presidential contenders signaled a renewed embrace of diversity, equity and inclusion this week at the National Action Network conference in New York, with speakers casting DEI as part of the country’s core civic identity and confronting Republican and Trump administration efforts to roll back such programs.
Jeffries, speaking to a packed audience of Black activists, framed the debate as one over civil rights and voting rights as much as over workplace and campus policy. He declared that “We have the high ground on this issue” and criticized Republicans as “extremists” who “are trying to do an all-out assault on civil rights, on voting rights, certainly on diversity, equity and inclusion.”
Jeffries also used DEI to argue Democrats were defending mainstream American values rather than a partisan concept. He contended that Republicans “are trying to elevate mediocrity,” and he said the party wants to argue that diversity, equity and inclusion are “foreign values.” “They’re not foreign values, they’re American values,” Jeffries said.
Speakers at the conference tied their DEI messaging to state-level policy moves, pointing to offices and funding they said help sustain equity initiatives even as the federal government pursues an anti-DEI agenda. Shapiro told attendees that Pennsylvania continues to maintain “an Office of Diversity and Equity and Inclusion,” saying other states “have shuttered them.”
Moore, described as the nation’s only sitting Black governor, said Maryland responded “unapologetically” to what he characterized as the rollback of DEI policies in Washington by creating state offices focused on supporting minority businesses and social mobility while combating racial inequality. He later told The Associated Press that “We are seeing what the policies and the position are when it comes to belief in diversity from this federal administration,” adding that “the future of how we should think about it should be seen in the present, of how places like Maryland are actually moving in this moment.”
Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker highlighted that he directed state officials to “set aside a whole bunch of that money to address inequities that have plagued the Black community over so many years” and defended Illinois’ approach to reducing socioeconomic and racial inequality.
Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear, expected to address the conference Saturday, was highlighted as a DEI supporter facing political backlash. Political adviser Eric Hyers said Beshear “never wavered even when there was a post-2024 backlash,” describing Beshear’s view as “that diversity is a strength, not a weakness.” The presentation also noted that Beshear vetoed a bill last year that would have banned DEI programs from public universities, and that the Republican-controlled legislature overrode that veto days later.
Sharpton, who founded and hosts the conference, said he was looking toward 2028 and wanted candidates to demonstrate their campaigns address the race gap directly rather than relying on broad generalities. He told The Associated Press he wanted 2028 contenders to show “that what they’re campaigning on is something that addresses the race gap in the country, specifically, not just generalizations.”
Rep. James Clyburn, a South Carolina Democrat and influential former chair of the Congressional Black Caucus, warned that leaders in either party who do not support DEI may oppose core American values. He told the AP: “DEI stands for ‘diversity, equity and inclusion.’ Who, in search for a more perfect union, would shy away from diversity equity and inclusion? If you’re against those things, you are against democracy.”
The remarks at the annual conference follow a broader shift in how DEI is discussed politically after Trump signed executive orders banning “illegal DEI” throughout the federal government and after a March order that required companies working with the federal government to comply with the administration’s anti-DEI platform. The AP report said Democrats had at times offered muted responses over the past year, including some blaming the party’s focus on diversity and identity for alienating some voters.
But speakers at the conference sought to reassert DEI within Democratic politics, portraying the renewed emphasis as aligned with courting and energizing Black voters who they said often view attacks on DEI as connected to opposition to civil rights and economic justice.