The Kansas Legislature on Friday approved a bill barring universities, community colleges and technical colleges from requiring statements about diversity, equity or inclusion as a condition of admission, financial aid or hiring.
The House approved the bill on an 81-40 vote. It was approved 28-11 in the Senate. The bill now goes to the governor. Enactment of the legislation would keep the state from withholding about $36 million in state funding from state universities.
One Democratic lawmaker compared the deal that the House made with the Senate to restore the money to higher education as blackmail or a hostage-taking.
The bill was advocated by Republican state Rep. Steven Howe of Salina, who said the measure was needed to protect free speech rights and academic freedom on college campuses.
Howe has had persisting questions about university job postings that have asked candidates about diversity, equity and inclusion.
“As DEI has expanded, it has created tension,” Howe said last month when he talked about the bill on the House floor.
“Not only tensions for students and faculty, but also for prospective applicants wanting to gain employment at post-secondary institutions of higher education.
“Instead of a merit-based approach, universities have chosen to embrace ideologies that discriminate against people that do not adhere to their orthodoxy,” he said.
Last year, Howe tried to add a measure to the state budget that prevented state universities from asking job applicants about diversity, equity and inclusion.
The governor vetoed the budget proviso that would have prevented state universities from demanding job applicants to articulate their experience or commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion. The Legislature failed to override the governor’s veto of the provision.
There’s been a battle over diversity, equity and inclusion throughout this legislative session.
The Senate’s confirmation of the Jon Rolph’s reappointment to the Board of Regents was delayed for months because concerns about his views about DEI.
And legislative auditors released an audit – requested by Howe – that detailed how much state universities had spent on DEI-related activities.
Democrats called the bill an overreach, saying it treads into an area that is vague and means different things to different people.
They question what problem the bill is trying to address, noting that the words diversity, equity and inclusion are positive attributes.
“Every college and university define DEI completely differently,” Democratic state Rep. Jason Probst of Hutchinson said on the floor Friday before the bill passed.
“We don’t have a clear definition of DEI,” Probst said.
“When we go out and do an audit and try to talk to the universities about this, there’s a lot of difference of opinion on what falls under DEI,” he said.
“We’re having a discussion about this one thing that maybe we think it’s one thing, but when we put it into application it’s quite different and it’s a lot more broad than we think.”
Republican state Rep. Bob Lewis of Garden City said a few years ago the terms diversity, equity and inclusion were benign.
Now, they’re used to suppress counter viewpoints on college campuses, he said.
“The problem is they’ve been politicized to the point that in many cases that it’s not DEI – diversity, equity and inclusion – but DEI – division, exclusion and intimidation.”
Democratic state Rep. Ford Carr of Wichita pressed Howe to define DEI and who would be covered by that definition. Carr was dissatisfied with the answer.
“I find it really strange that we’re using a term and we haven’t even identified what that term means. That part to me is just almost inexcusable.”
The bill bans schools from requiring pledges or statements regarding “diversity, equity, inclusion” as a basis for denying admission, financial aid, promoting a faculty member or hiring a job applicant.
Howe has said the bill doesn’t ban universities from spending money on DEI programs. He said it’s limited to using DEI in employment, admissions and financial aid decisions.
A violation of the law carries a $10,000 fine for each violation.
The bill allows someone who believes their rights were violated to file a complaint with the Board of Regents to investigate.
If the board’s investigation doesn’t turn up a violation, a complaint could be filed with the attorney general, who would investigate.
If the attorney general finds a violation, that institution would have 90 days to remedy the violation.
If the violation is not corrected, the attorney general could take the school to court. A $10,000 fine for each violation could be levied if the court finds a violation.
