Military Paradigm Swinging Away from Wokeism Toward Meritocracy

We are witnessing in our military a major paradigm shift toward common sense and away from wokeism – defined as progressivism taken to extremes and imposed with coercion, even if it hurts the institution. 

This won’t be easy because the weeds of wokeism are deeply rooted in the Defense Department, and they did not spring up overnight.  Pentagon ideologues have been cultivating them for years. 

In 2011, the Military Leadership Diversity Commission issued a 162-page report titled From Representation to Inclusion: Diversity Leadership for the 21^st Century.  MLDC recommendations shifted the military’s cultural priorities away from meritocracy and non-discrimination toward “diversity, equity, and inclusion” (DEI) as paramount goals. 

Previously, the armed forces assigned priority to individual merit, performance, and the needs of the military.  The MLDC altered that paradigm by rejecting “color-blind” policies and admitting that “fair treatment” was “not about treating everyone the same.” 

Under President Joe Biden, diversity-crats ruled the Pentagon.  On January 20, however, President Trump signed an Executive Order Ending Radical and Wasteful Government DEI Programs and Preferencing. 

As CMR reported here, Trump’s EO called for termination of all discriminatory programs, including the Biden Administration’s vast DEI bureaucracy, chief diversity officer (CDO) positions, universal Equity Action Plans, and illegal diversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility (DEIA) programs . . . “under whatever name they appear.”

Another EO, Ending Illegal Discrimination and Restoring Merit-Based Opportunity (Jan. 21), affirmed the policy of the United States to “protect the civil rights of all Americans and to promote individual initiative, excellence, and hard work.” 

This order cited the Supreme Court’s decision in Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard and the University of N. Carolina, (2023).  It also revoked President Lyndon Johnson ’s 1965 Executive Order that inadvertently created today’s system of racial categorization, which the Supreme Court described as “imprecise. . . overbroad . . . arbitrary . . . undefined . . . incoherent, [and based on] irrational stereotypes.”  

Reinforcing Trump’s EO Restoring America’s Fighting Force (Jan. 27) Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s January 29 Memorandum stated: “The DoD will strive to provide merit-based, color-blind, equal opportunities to Service members but will not guarantee or strive for equal outcomes.” 

A key Executive Order titled Defending Women from Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government (Jan. 20) restored sound policy with an honest  endorsement of science: “’Sex’ shall refer to an individual’s immutable biological classification as either male or female.  Sex is not a synonym for and does not include the concept of ‘gender identity.’”

The truth-telling EO continued: “Efforts to eradicate the biological reality of sex fundamentally attack women by depriving them of their dignity, safety, and well-being.  “[Therefore,] it is the policy of the United States to recognize two sexes, male and female.  These sexes are not changeable and are grounded in fundamental and incontrovertible reality.”  

Referring to “legal and other socially coercive means to permit men to self-identify as women and gain access to intimate single-sex spaces and activities designed for women, from women’s domestic abuse shelters to women’s workplace showers,” Trump affirmed, “This is wrong.”  

Under Biden-era transgender policies, military women were forced to accept in their private living areas men who changed their “gender marker” in the Defense Enrollment Eligibility Reporting System (DEERS).  Secretary Hegseth’s February 7 Memorandum and “Additional Guidance” (Feb. 26) changed that: “All military records will reflect the Service member's sex” and “Access to intimate spaces will be determined by Service members' or applicants for military service's sex.”

The EO titled Prioritizing Military Excellence and Readiness (Jan. 27) directed the Secretary of Defense to restore gender dysphoria to the list of psychological conditions that make a person ineligible for military service due to “excessive time lost from duty for necessary treatment or hospitalization.” (DoDI 6130.03). 

Under the January 27 order, defense dollars will no longer provide expensive subsidies for lifelong hormones or surgeries that attempt to change sex, and the DoD will end mandatory use of “invented pronouns . . . that inaccurately reflect an individual’s sex.”

Another order, Protecting Children from Chemical and Surgical Mutilation (Jan. 28), confronted “the radical and false claim that adults can change a child’s sex through a series of irreversible medical interventions.  This dangerous trend will be a stain on our Nation’s history, and it must end.”  

Consistent with these common sense orders, the January 31 News Release Identity Months Dead at DoD (Jan. 31) prohibited “Pride” events, including sexualized drag performances before military children and paid time off and travel to participate in such events. 

President Trump’s order titled Ending Radical Indoctrination in K-12 Schooling (Jan. 29) eliminated funding for CRT indoctrination in K-12 schools, meaning teachings that “Members of one race, color, sex, or national origin are morally or inherently superior . . . [or] An individual, by virtue of the individual’s race, color, sex, or national origin, is inherently racist, sexist, or oppressive, whether consciously or unconsciously.” 

The order also prohibited military school CRT programs teaching that the United States “is fundamentally racist, sexist, or otherwise discriminatory.”

The Trump Administration’s bold executive actions will not be permanent unless Congress codifies them in law.  In doing so, Congress should affirm four main principles: Merit as the exclusive basis for personnel actions, a prohibition of non-merit factors such as racial or gender preferences, clear definitions for all key terms, and narrow exceptions to permit mission-specific operational requirements.   

Three more principles should guide congressional action to eliminate wokeism in the military: Defund DEI and CRT in all DoD agencies, deter “re-branding” by defining divisive DEI practices, and repeal previous legislation authorizing DEI personal and operations.

A statute incorporating these elements would be a durable way to support our military by affirming meritocracy, ending discrimination, and restoring common sense programs that strengthen military readiness and morale.

Elaine Donnelly is President of the Center for Military Readiness, an independent public policy organization founded in 1993, which reports on and analyzes military/social issues.  More information is available at www.cmrlink.org.