Just a few days later Indiana Governor Mike Braun After being sworn in in Indianapolis, the former Republican senator officially stripped state government of its diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) apparatus.
Instead, Braun — who grew a small truck body company in Jasper called Meyer Distributing into a major player with 700 product lines — said Friday it needed a politician who “signed the front of a paycheck” to understand what economic priorities really matter. and DEI is not one of them.
“At [Indiana] inaugural, which was this weekend for me, there was so much excitement knowing that something was happening even in a good red state like Indiana, mainly because of what’s going to happen in Washington and of the partnership that can occur between enterprising States like ours. it always has been,” Braun said on “Fox & Friends.”
“We’ve never really had someone from Main Street … to be our own governor here.”
BRAUN DEMANDS FULL AUDIT OF MEDICARE AFTER FRAUD DISCOVERY
Braun compared the conservative economic vision to that of President Biden and other Democrats, whose agenda is “based on big government.”
“Rahm Emanuel said ‘never let a crisis go to waste,'” he said in this regard, referring to former President Barack Obama’s motto during the 2008 financial crisis. This phrase was seen as a suggestion to use difficult times to impose the principles of one’s personal agenda.
In comments to Fox News Digital, Braun said that in nearly 40 years of running a business, he knows what works and what doesn’t.
Instead of DEI, Indiana needs “MEI” — or merit, excellence and innovation — to be a priority, he said.
“Government should be focused on one thing: getting results for the people it serves. We are replacing DEI’s divisive ideology with a level playing field for MEI – for the same reason we are eliminating requirements in terms of academic degrees where they are not essential and adding key performance indicators for accountability,” Braun said.
“[That is] because everyone should be judged by what they do, not by what they are. »
Braun highlighted his business background and reiterated that his guiding principle in building Meyer into the growing company it is today has been “results – first and foremost.”
DEMS TRYING TO CONVERT ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS INTO VOTERS WAS A “BIG CALCULATION MISTAKE”: MIKE BRAUN
The State Capitol building in downtown Indianapolis. (Educational Images/Universal Images Group via Getty Images)
“That’s exactly what we’re prioritizing in my administration.”
In his order, Braun cited the Supreme Court’s decision in Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard – which concluded that affirmative action programs violated the Equal Protection Clause – and said state resources would not be used to “support [DEI] positions, departments, activities, procedures or programs if they provide preferential treatment based on a person’s particular race…”
It also prohibits Indians from requiring that they disclose their personal pronouns or employers from requiring job applicants to provide a DEI statement.
“We’ve grown the federal government to a point where I hope DOGE… will bring it down because you have a lot of anxious governors who want to double down. [DOGE] — we’re going to do it anyway,” Braun said separately on Fox News Channel.
Braun said that since COVID-19, too many Indiana bureaucrats are still teleworking and that efforts to eliminate DEI are also another way to streamline government to be more efficient, just like Meyer.
The state’s DEI office had been created by Braun’s predecessor, Republican Gov. Eric Holcomb.
After the George Floyd incident in Minnesota, Holcomb addressed Indians on the issue of “addressing the root causes of inequality and not just reacting to the symptoms.”
CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP
Holcomb, who first rose to the governorship when Mike Pence became vice president in 2017, named Karrah Herring, then the University of Notre Dame’s director of public affairs, to lead the new DEI department.
Braun also received some pushback about his decision:
Indiana’s House minority leader said he respected Braun’s right to position his new administration the way he wanted, but questioned the hierarchy he had chosen.
“Thinking about the myriad of issues Hoosiers face, I don’t understand why this is a top priority,” state Rep. Phil GiaQuinta, D-Fort Wayne, said in a statement.
GiaQuinta added that a recent caucus meeting with the DEI office was “insightful and helpful” for their work to address the needs of Indians, and called the department’s demise a “distraction from real issues.”
