By August 2024, campaigns organized on X by activist Robby Starbuck have targeted individual firms including Tractor Supply, John Deere, Harley-Davidson, and Lowe’s, several of which announce in the same weeks that they are scaling back diversity, equity, and inclusion programs. The pressure builds on an earlier, differently shaped phase: the 2023 proxy season sees a marked rise in shareholder proposals opposing DEI initiatives, and after the Supreme Court’s June 2023 ruling on race-conscious college admissions — which does not apply to private employers — opponents of corporate DEI invoke it in pressing companies to change course.
What Is Not Established Here
This entry previously stated that the ruling “is subsequently cited by several companies as the stated basis for revising their own policies.” No cited source supports that. The slip opinion cannot, and the CNN piece does not mention the Supreme Court at all. What the sources do establish is weaker and differently shaped: the ruling emboldened opponents of corporate DEI, who invoked it against programs it did not legally reach. Whether any particular company gave it as its own reason is not established here.
A truth-social platform link was also removed. The CNN source describes Starbuck’s campaigns as organised on X — “Truth Social” appears nowhere in it, and no other cited source mentions the platform.