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Editorial Note: Opinions and thoughts are the author’s own and not those of AFROTECH™. The culture and energy of the tech industry has changed overnight. The industry once stereotyped as a bastion of liberalism, which has a history of backing more liberal candidates in presidential elections, has changed. This all became more apparent during the 2024 presidential election between Kamala Harris and now President Donald Trump . During the election, the industry was split in a way that felt unprecedented to those who had been in the industry for the past 20 years. When Trump was first elected to office, his presidency appeared to be one that the industry would resist, given his first term as president as well as his 2020 campaign. He had policy views and beliefs that were against what the tech industry stood for, specifically around the topics of immigration, social media moderation, and climate change. What we saw leading up to the 2024 presidential election was not only less...
Several scholarships supporting Black medical students in Cincinnati, OH, are under review, The Washington Post reports. The shift is influenced by a pushback against diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) efforts under the Trump administration. As AFROTECH™ previously told you, DEI programs, roles, and initiatives were dismantled at the federal level. This led corporations and universities to adjust their policies in response to pressure from conservative groups. In 2023, the Supreme Court also reversed its stance on affirmative action, effectively ending the consideration of race in college admissions, according to NPR. “I got into medical school in 1972, and I’m not ashamed to tell anybody that it was because of affirmative action,” Kenneth Davis, a former Black general surgeon who retired in 2020, told The Washington Post. “I wasn’t the dumbest guy in the class. There were the children of faculty, alumni, and donors, and some of them struggled a lot more than I did, so I say...
Howard University is not aligned with the Trump administration’s request to revert funding levels back to 2021. Why Federal Funding Proposal Was Made The Hill reports that the nation’s only federally chartered Historically Black College and University (HBCU) received a one-time payment valued at $64 million to support the construction of a hospital at the school. That hospital has been completed, therefore the Trump administration is not looking to provide that extra funding for the 2026 year. Trump also shares that he doesn’t intend to cut the federal funding budget for HBCUs that is already in place. “I got them more money than they ever dreamt possible, and they’re in great shape now,” Trump said referring to a 2019 bill that started allocating over $250 million yearly to HBCUs starting in 2021, according to the outlet. “They have long-term financing. Nobody did that but Donald Trump.” Howard University Responds Howard University is requesting that its budget for the 2026 year...
Harvard University professors are donating a portion of their salaries to the Ivy League after it lost federal funding. As AFROTECH™ previously told you, Harvard received two letters from federal agencies instructing it to discontinue its diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) commitments. The letters stated that failure to comply could result in the loss of about $9 billion in federal funding. According to Reuters, some of the conditions included reducing the influence of faculty, staff, and students who are “more committed to activism than scholarship.” Additionally, the letters requested an external panel to audit these groups for alignment with “viewpoint diversity,” arguing that the university has “failed to live up to both the intellectual and civil rights conditions that justify federal investment.” The letters also flagged concerns about unchallenged antisemitism. While Harvard University did agree to address concerns about antisemitism on campus, it also stated, “These ends...
The Office of Equity, Diversity, Inclusion, and Belonging at Harvard University will now be called the Office of Community and Campus Life. Sherri A. Charleston, previously Harvard’s chief diversity officer and now the chief community and campus life officer, shared this news via email on April 28, 2025, according to The Harvard Crimson. The announcement aligns with the Trump administration’s push to eliminate diversity, equity, and inclusion ( DEI ) programming at schools and universities nationwide. “In the weeks and months ahead, we will take steps to make this change concrete and to work with all of Harvard’s schools and units to implement these vital objectives, including shared efforts to reexamine and reshape the missions and programs of offices across the university,” Charleston wrote, per The Crimson. Charleston noted that in the 2024 campus-wide Pulse Survey, students, faculty, and staff reported feeling a strong sense of belonging; however, a significant number still felt...
President Donald Trump has signed several executive orders that will impact education. Historically Black Colleges And Universities According to a press release, an executive order by Trump establishes a White House Initiative on HBCUs and seeks to enhance the quality of education at these universities through private-sector partnerships, as well as institutional and workforce development in industries such as technology, health care, manufacturing, and finance. The initiative will also work to ensure federal and state grant dollars are more accessible and plans to launch a yearly White House Summit geared toward HBCUs to determine goals and establish partnerships. At the same time, the order establishes the President’s Board of Advisors on HBCUs, which will exist under the Department of Education and include changemakers in philanthropy, education , business, finance, entrepreneurship , innovation, private foundations, and HBCU presidents. “HBCUs are essential to fostering...
Harvard University is suing the Trump administration for threatening to withhold federal funding after the university refused to comply with demands the government outlined in a letter dated April 11, 2025. On Monday, April 21, Harvard University President Alan Garber announced the lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Boston, MA, in a letter published on the university’s website. In the letter, he said the administration’s demands violate the First Amendment, disregard federal law, and threaten life-saving medical research. “Moments ago, we filed a lawsuit to halt the funding freeze because it is unlawful and beyond the government’s authority,” Garber wrote. “…Before taking punitive action, the law requires that the federal government engage with us about the ways we are fighting and will continue to fight antisemitism. Instead, the government’s April 11 demands seek to control whom we hire and what we teach.” On April 14, the Trump administration’s Joint Task Force to Combat...
Connecticut will not be bowing to Trump’s orders regarding diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) in education. As AFROTECH™ previously reported, on Feb. 14, the Trump Administration imposed a strict two-week timeline for schools and universities to comply with his orders around DEI such as no longer allowing “racial preferences” to be considered in admissions, financial aid, or hiring. “Educational institutions may neither separate nor segregate students based on race, nor distribute benefits or burdens based on race,” the memo read. Failure to comply could risk the loss of federal funding, particularly around Title 1 funding, which supports underserved families. Harvard University is currently under a $2.3 billion federal freeze for pushing back. “The university will not surrender its independence or relinquish its constitutional rights. Neither Harvard nor any other private university can allow itself to be taken over by the federal government,” a letter penned from the Ivy...
Editorial Note: Opinions and thoughts are the author’s own and not those of AFROTECH™. Billionaire business leaders turned against President Donald Trump as he implemented sweeping tariffs with other countries, which have amounted to billions of dollars lost. Many of the billionaires who have pushed back against the Trump tariffs have also endorsed him for the 2024 presidential election. One of those billionaires, Bill Ackman, warned against tariffs, likening them to an “economic nuclear war” in a post on X (formerly known as Twitter). He also claimed that the tariffs weren’t what he voted for, despite Trump speaking on tariffs early on in the election. How Will Tariffs Affect The American Consumer? Unwarranted tariffs will not only decimate our economy but also hurt our already fragile standing on the world stage. In retaliation, China has raised tariffs on American goods to 125%. Most business leaders, economic experts, and other world leaders are confused over Trump’s misguided...
The Trump administration has rescinded a historic settlement designed to improve wastewater treatment services for residents in majority-Black communities in Lowndes County, Alabama, where inadequate infrastructure has long led to raw sewage exposure. On Friday, April 11, 2025, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) announced the termination of the 2-year-old agreement made with the Alabama Department of Public Health (ADPH) under the Biden administration , describing it as an “ illegal DEI and environmental justice policy.” “The DOJ will no longer push ‘environmental justice’ as viewed through a distorting, DEI lens,” said Assistant Attorney General Harmeet K. Dhillon. “ President [Donald] Trump made it clear: Americans deserve a government committed to serving every individual with dignity and respect, and to expending taxpayer resources in accordance with the national interest, not arbitrary criteria.” On Jan. 20, 2025 — his first day back in office — Trump had signed an executive...
Harvard University does not intend to change its DEI efforts to align with the Trump Administration. As AFROTECH™ previously told you, President Donald Trump issued a two-week deadline that requires schools and university to no longer consider “racial preferences” in admissions, financial aid, or hiring. Educational institutions that fail to comply risk losing federal funding. T his aligns with the administration’s goal to dismantle diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) efforts, which has played out with the closing and ending of “ all DEIA initiatives, offices and programs” within the federal government. “Colleges and universities are going to find themselves between a rock and a hard place,” Angel B. Pérez, CEO of the National Association for College Admission Counseling, said to AP News at the time. “They know that what they’re doing is not illegal, but they are worried that if they do not comply, not having federal funding will decimate them.” Harvard University Responds In a...
The Trump administration has repealed a Biden-era policy that guaranteed a baseline wage for workers on federal contracts, cutting the federal contractor minimum wage down from $17.75 an hour. However, the move still leaves an Obama-era rule in place that puts the minimum at $13.30 an hour. With that single change, hundreds of thousands of private-sector workers employed by federal contractors are at risk of wage reductions up to 25% — a shift that will disproportionately affect workers without college degrees and those already earning near-poverty wages, the Center for American Progress reports. The Federal Contractor Minimum Wage: A Lifeline Now Lost The now-defunct regulation, established under Executive Order 14026, raised the federal contractor minimum wage in 2021 to $15 and indexed it to inflation, bringing it to $17.75 in 2025. It was designed to ensure that janitors, cooks, maintenance workers, and other federal contract laborers earned a livable wage. More than 327,000...
Editorial Note: Opinions and thoughts are the author’s own and not those of AFROTECH™. President Donald Trump has gone all in on his tariff crusade, announcing last week a 10% tariff on almost every country with even higher tariffs on specific countries. From beauty and food to car automation , every industry is currently reeling with the stock market dovetailing, and the potential negative aftereffects will be felt for decades to come. However, the now billion-dollar AI industry is at risk of being decimated thanks to Trump’s tariffs. Pro-crypto and pro-AI fanatics have curried a lot of favor with the president, so much so that many of them have been appointed as high government officials to advance America’s standing in the global AI race. Even though Trump has reversed his initial thoughts towards technology, his insistence on tariffs may hurt the AI industry after all. According to Time, AI companies, along with several other industries, lost billions of dollars when the tariffs...
The United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has received clearance to request personal information from the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) about undocumented taxpayers. On Monday, April 7, 2025, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the IRS filed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) signed by Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, according to The Guardian. The agreement gives immigration enforcement officials unprecedented access to help President Donald Trump fulfill his promise of mass deportations as his administration continues to investigate undocumented immigrants still in the country after receiving a final removal order from a judge. “As laid out in the MOU, DHS can legally request return information relating to individuals under criminal investigation, and the IRS must provide it,” per a court filing, which outlines the procedures for making such requests and specifies the role of each agency in accessing the...
Friday, April 4, 2025, marked the second consecutive day major U.S. stock indexes fell sharply, a downtrend that follows President Donald Trump’s recent tariffs announcement and China’s Friday morning declaration to impose a 34% duty on U.S. goods in retaliation. According to NBC News, significant market losses included Tesla , Elon Musk’s electric vehicle company, which fell by approximately 10%; agricultural equipment leader Caterpillar, down about 6%; and top AI chip manufacturer Nvidia, which declined by approximately 7%. The S&P 500 index, which tracks 500 leading U.S. companies, dropped more than 4%, down more than 16% from its peak. The Russell 2000 index, which follows stocks of smaller U.S. companies, plummeted by 5.3%. Global markets also experienced significant sell-offs, with European stocks declining 10% from recent highs and Asian markets facing sharp drops. After the market had closed on Wednesday, April 2, 2025, Trump announced from the White House’s Rose Garden that...