(Miami) Florida Governor Ron DeSantis on Monday signed laws to end diversity programs at public universities in his state, once again healing his image as a slayer of “well-meaning”.
The 44-year-old elected official is expected to start the 2024 presidential race soon, but seems to want to consolidate his conservative record before challenging Donald Trump in the Republican primaries.
After restrictions on abortion or illegal immigration, he initialed laws on Monday concerning campuses, which the right regularly accuses of being the stronghold of intolerant “woke” leftists.
The first text “reorients our universities on their traditional mission” and puts an end to “the relatively new concept called Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI)” which has spread after the major anti-racist demonstrations of 2020, he said during a meeting. ‘a press conference.
“They were used as a veneer to impose an ideological program […] and should instead be called Discrimination, Exclusion and Indoctrination,” he continued.
PHOTO STEPHEN MATUREN, AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis
Specifically, the law prohibits universities from funding programs seeking to diversify the profile of their students and teachers, but also the teaching of courses on racial or sexual issues.
“If you want to study things like gender ideology, go to Berkeley,” a big college in California with a progressive reputation, Ron DeSantis said. “But, with taxpayer dollars, we’re going to focus on the University’s classic mission.”
In a similar vein, the second law prohibits institutions “from requiring students and employees to make political affiliations – they call it diversity statements –[…] in order to be recruited,” he said.
The measures were strongly criticized by the left and the teaching world. Florida Democrat Anna Eskamani decried “a destructive law that attacks students from diverse backgrounds […] and suppresses academic freedom”.