Labor & Employment Law Daily Wrap Up, AGENCY NEWS—HHS inquiring into alleged ‘discrimination’ involving DEI in health care workforce, (Mar 10, 2025)

By Jason Albright, J.D.

The HHS initiatives come on the heels of Executive Order 14173, concerned with “illegal DEI and DEIA policies.”

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has announced that its Office of Civil Rights (OCR) has opened four investigations of medical schools and hospitals that it alleges are operating medical education, training, or scholarship programs with race- or sex-based criteria that allegedly conflict with Executive Order 14173, which directs federal agencies to take steps “to combat illegal private sector [diversity, equity and inclusion] DEI preferences, mandates, policies, programs, and activities.”

The investigations, according to the agency, “are in response to allegations and information OCR received that certain medical schools and hospitals that receive HHS funding may operate medical education, training, or scholarship programs for current or prospective workforce members that discriminate on the basis of race, color, national origin, or sex.” “National policy under Executive Order 14173,” the agency continued, “directs federal agencies to enforce long-standing civil rights laws and ‘to combat illegal private sector [diversity, equity and inclusion] DEI preferences, mandates, policies, programs, and activities.’”

Under Executive Order 14173, according to the HHS announcement, each agency, in coordination with the Attorney General, is required to identify “nine potential civil compliance investigations” of corporations, associations, foundations, and institutions of higher education with endowments over one billion dollars as part of a strategic enforcement plan.

The executive order, in fact, says that each agency “shall identify up to nine potential civil compliance investigations of publicly traded corporations, large non-profit corporations or associations, foundations with assets of 500 million dollars or more, State and local bar and medical associations, and institutions of higher education with endowments over 1 billion dollars” (emphasis supplied).

“Today’s actions restore merit-based opportunities in medicine and signify that hard-working health care professionals and high-achieving students in the pipeline for medical and nursing fields should not be demeaned at work, or excluded from professional or scholarship opportunities, because of their race or sex,” commented Anthony Archeval, Acting Director of OCR at HHS.

News: Discrimination RaceDiscrimination SexDiscrimination AgencyNews WhiteHouseNews ESGNews