State Department officials must promote diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) to receive promotions, according to documents obtained by National Review.
The report comes a week after Secretary of State Anthony Blinken announced the Department’s Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility (DEIA) Strategic Plan, which would make information about the demographic makeup of the department more transparent.
“The DEIA Strategic Plan will make workforce data more accessible to Department leadership teams and employees alike, set goals for recruiting and retaining a diverse workforce, enhance the reasonable accommodations process, and establish concrete measures to promote greater inclusivity for women, employees with disabilities, LGBTQI+ employees, and religious, racial, and ethnic minorities,” Blinken said in a statement September 13th. (RELATED: REPORT: House Republicans To Investigate Chamber Of Commerce Over ESG If They Take The Majority)
The document NR obtained, called “Decision Criteria for Tenure and Promotion in the Foreign Service,” says that employees are expected to, “[take] advantage of opportunities to promote diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility in interactions with colleagues and interlocutors.”
New: An internal document obtained exclusively by National Review provides further detail on how State Department officials must now promote and advance DEI principles to receive tenure and promotions. @NRO https://t.co/oDmHxpiUqP
— Jimmy Quinn (@james_t_quinn) September 20, 2022
Foreign service officers are encouraged to recognize that “unconscious biases can affect decisions and actions and [take] steps to identify and mitigate them in the evaluation of others’ performance.”
The report is in line with previous department actions aimed at enforcing Biden administration DEIA rules. In 2021, the State Department announced the appointment of Ambassador Gina Abercrombie-Winstanley as Chief Diversity and Inclusion Officer at the department.
“And as President Biden has made clear, prioritizing diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility is also a national security imperative,” Blinken said at the time.