One of the first executive orders President Donald Trump signed in January declared war on diversity, equity, and inclusion, or “DEI,” initiatives in schools and workplaces. It’s been left to the Justice Department’s overstretched team of government lawyers to pick battles in the president’s campaign against equality measures. As part of that mission, according to The Wall Street Journal, the DOJ is now scrutinizing corporations with federal contracts:
Alphabet’s Google and Verizon Communications are among a list of companies that have received Justice Department demands for documents and information about their workplace programs, according to people familiar with the investigations.
Other companies being scrutinized come from industries ranging from automotive and pharmaceuticals to defense and utilities, the people familiar with the investigations said, and some have met in person with Justice Department officials. A complete list of companies being targeted couldn’t be learned.
Neither the companies named nor the Justice Department provided comment to the Journal, and MS NOW has yet to independently verify the Journal’s reporting.
The Justice Department is reportedly looking to make novel use of the False Claims Act, an 1863 law written to take on profiteering defense contractors bilking the Union government. In recent years, it’s been more often used against health care corporations that overcharge the government for services provided. For example, in 2003, a health care company run by Rick Scott, before he became a Republican senator from Florida, was forced to pay out more than $1.7 billion in fines and repayments.
The hunt for DEI is a major waste of resources from a Justice Department that has been struggling with its workload during Attorney General Pam Bondi’s MAGA-ficiation of the department.
Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche flagged this new approach using the False Claims Act in a May memo announcing a new “Civil Rights Fraud Initiative.” Blanche asserted that Trump’s executive order “Ending Illegal Discrimination and Restoring Merit-Based Opportunity” bars companies from taking federal money “while knowingly engaging in racist preferences, mandates, policies, programs, and activities,” including DEI programs. Those who do, he warned, could be held liable under the False Claims Act. (Notably, Trump also rescinded President Lyndon B. Johnson’s executive order barring federal contractors from practicing discrimination, undercutting his supposed commitment to equal treatment under the law.)
Aside from the major shift in how the Trump administration law wants this law applied, Blanche’s memo marks a change in how the Justice Department is handling these cases. The anti-DEI push has generally been the purview of the department’s Civil Rights Division, but Blanche’s strategy calls upon the Civil Division’s Fraud Section, which enforces the False Claims Act, to get in on the act alongside the Civil Rights Division. Both teams were ordered in the memo to assign a team of attorneys to “aggressively pursue this work,” alongside an assistant United States attorney drawn from each of the country’s 93 U.S. Attorney’s offices.
The Wall Street Journal noted that while False Claims Act cases usually spring from corporate whistleblowers or federal watchdogs, the probes underway against Google, Verizon and other companies “have been spurred by politically appointed officials in the department who believe companies with contracts aren’t abiding by their obligations to the government if they still embrace diversity, equity and inclusion programs.”
On a basic level, the proactive effort underway is another example of the clear politicization of the legal system, exactly what we don’t want to see from the Justice Department. The hunt for DEI is also a major waste of resources from a Justice Department that has been struggling with its workload during Attorney General Pam Bondi’s MAGA-ficiation of the department.
It may herald a future ramping up from the Justice Department to recruit bounty hunters inside major companies who are willing to file False Claims Act cases against their employers. Blanche’s May memo highlighted the avenues “whistleblowers” could use to report this supposedly fraudulent behavior. If the government takes over a case filed by a private party, or realtor, and either wins or settles, the whistleblower gets between 15-25% of the total award. (For example, the group of whistleblowers who alerted the government to fraud in the health care company that Rick Scott ran split more than $151 million among themselves.) The government relying on staffers actively hunting through Verizon and Google’s documents is surprising given the financial incentive baked into the False Claims Act. It may underscore a lack of anti-DEI zeal from these companies’ employees. It may also herald a future ramping up from the Justice Department to recruit bounty hunters inside major companies who are willing to file False Claims Act cases against their employers. Of course, it’s also possible that a payday would never come for private individuals who flag cases of supposed DEI-related fraud. This use of the False Claims Act hasn’t been tested in court and could easily fall flat. Even so, the mere fact that DOJ is pursuing this route is chilling in and of itself. Because even if the cases go nowhere, or don’t result in charges, businesses with less money than Google may step up efforts to roll back their diversity programs. MAGA pours a lot of resources into achieving its goals, but it prefers that its targets for bullying comply in advance.
Hayes Brown is a writer and editor for MS NOW Daily. 
