Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth has ordered for the end of affirmative action admissions at U.S. military academies.
On Wednesday, Hegseth issued a memo on “Restoring America’s Fighting Force” that outlines the DoD’s plans to implement “merit-based, color-blind policies.”
”Diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) policies, as defined in the January 27, 2025,
Executive Order, are incompatible with the values of DoD,” Hegseth writes. ”The DoD will strive to provide
merit-based, color-blind, equal opportunities to Service members but will not guarantee or strive
for equal outcomes.”
The defense secretary’s memo aligns with President Trump’s executive order, also named “Restoring America’s Fighting Force,” which states that “[n]o individual or group within our Armed Forces should be preferred or disadvantaged on the basis of sex, race, ethnicity, color, or creed.”
Hegseth’s plan calls for the end of DEI practices in military academies, which include the United States Military Academy (West Point) and the United States Naval Academy (Annapolis).
”No DoD Component will establish sex-based, race-based, or ethnicity-based goals for organizational composition, academic admission,
or career fields,” Hegseth declares.
”No
element within DoD will provide instruction on Critical Race Theory (CRT), DEI, or gender
ideology as part of a curriculum or for purposes of workforce training,” he continues. ”The U.S. Service Academies and other defense
academic institutions shall teach that America and its founding documents remain the most
powerful force for good in human history.”
Despite the Supreme Court ruling that race-based affirmative action admissions policies were unconstitutional during 2023, U.S. service academies were exempt from the decision.
Recent legal challenges to undo the exemption have fallen short. In December, a Maryland federal judge upheld race-conscious admissions at the Naval Academy, arguing that a “racially diverse officer corps” constituted a “national security interest.”
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In concluding his memo, Hegseth writes that the DoD will track the progress of the new merit-based policy prescriptions through the creation of a Restoring America’s Fighting Force Task Force.
”The strength of the DoD comes from our unity and our shared purpose,” Hegseth notes. ”We will focus on
lethality, meritocracy, accountability, standards, and readiness. Providing Service members an
equal opportunity to excel will help us remain the strongest and most lethal fighting force the
world has ever known.”
This article was originally published at campusreform.org
