The feds are coming for Nike’s range packages. The Equal Employment Alternative Fee filed court docket papers Wednesday demanding the sportswear big hand over data about alleged discrimination towards white staff.
EEOC Chair Andrea Lucas launched the investigation herself final yr.
She claims Nike’s range targets may violate federal regulation by creating bias towards white staff in hiring and promotions. The company desires Nike’s layoff standards from 2018 ahead.
They’re additionally demanding particulars about 16 packages that allegedly gave race-restricted mentoring and management alternatives to staff.
“Title VII’s prohibition of race-based employment discrimination is colorblind,” Lucas stated in a press release. “The EEOC will take all needed steps to make sure the chance to totally examine.”
Nike pushed again laborious towards the federal calls for. The corporate known as the subpoena enforcement motion “a stunning and weird escalation” in court docket filings.
“We now have shared hundreds of pages of data and detailed written responses,” Nike stated in a press release. “We’re within the technique of offering extra info.”
Nike’s authorized staff beforehand known as the subpoena “overbroad, unduly burdensome, imprecise, ambiguous, and disproportionate.” The corporate has been preventing the federal requests for months.
The investigation stems from Nike’s public range commitments after George Floyd’s dying in 2020. The corporate set targets to achieve 35% illustration of racial minorities in its company workforce by 2025.
Nike additionally tied government compensation to range aims. Leaders received bonuses for growing girls in management positions and hitting minority illustration targets on the director stage and above.
Are you a white male who has skilled discrimination at work primarily based in your race or intercourse?
You’ll have a declare to get well cash underneath federal civil rights legal guidelines. Contact the @USEEOC as quickly as attainable.The EEOC is dedicated to figuring out, attacking, and eliminating ALL race… pic.twitter.com/BYjbld5zdv
— EEOC Chair Andrea Lucas (@andrealucasEEOC) December 17, 2025
Lucas filed her discrimination cost in Might 2024 when she was nonetheless a commissioner. The cost got here after America First Authorized, Stephen Miller’s conservative group, urged the EEOC to analyze Nike’s range practices.
Lucas posted on social media in December, urging white males to file discrimination complaints. The submit directed staff to contact the company “as quickly as attainable” about DEI-related bias.
The Trump administration has made attacking DEI packages a prime precedence. President Donald Trump campaigned towards range initiatives for creating “anti-white feeling” in workplaces.
On his first day again in workplace, Trump moved to wipe out DEI packages throughout the federal authorities and the army. He’s additionally threatening to strip billions in federal funding from universities with range packages.
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