If the State Board of Education and Idaho’s universities thought they could head off a debate over DEI, they were wrong.
Instead, some legislators seem determined to kill off diversity, equity and inclusion programs that are pretty much dead already.
Dead because, in December, the State Board ordered the colleges and universities to shut down any student centers “based on DEI ideology.” The State Board set a June 30 deadline that is all but moot, because Boise State University and Idaho State University scrambled to shut down student centers ahead of the State Board vote, and the University of Idaho hastily announced a shutdown plan hours after the vote.
But for legislators — including some who have made DEI a rallying cry for years — these moves didn’t go far enough.
A Statehouse hearing last week offered a glimpse into the Legislature’s mindset, and a unusual peek into the sausage making of writing a bill.
It was a meeting of the Legislature’s DEI task force — an ad hoc and decidedly conservative group that has been meeting since October. The House-Senate task force isn’t a standing legislative committee, so it can only make recommendations.
The task force has no official say, but Rep. Barbara Ehardt had plenty to say.
The Idaho Falls Republican commended the State Board for getting on board on DEI, belatedly. In July 2019, Ehardt fired off a letter, cosigned by 27 colleagues, urging newly hired Boise State President Marlene Tromp to rein in diversity programs. Ehardt asked State Board Executive Director Joshua Whitworth to explain the board’s silence at the time.
Whitworth, who only joined the State Board in July, offered a boilerplate answer. “There’s an ebb and flow of issues over time.”
There hasn’t been a whole lot of ebb and flow in some Statehouse circles. Legislative conservatives have steadfastly opposed DEI, looking to cut budgets and restrict spending in a multiyear campaign to choke off social justice programs. They now see an opportunity to put their permanent imprint on the issue, with a law that would carry more weight than a State Board policy.
Enter Sen. Ben Toews, R-Coeur d’Alene.
The second-term lawmaker represents a growing hardline wing in the Senate. Last month, he was elected to Senate leadership, as the GOP’s caucus chairman. Last week, he walked the rest of the task force through his version of a draft anti-DEI bill.
It’s an unabashed mishmash. It draws from laws in Iowa, Texas and Alabama, and incorporates an exhaustive list of terms that, in Toews’ view, advances DEI principles. At one point, Ehardt asked Toews if the goal is to prevent colleges and universities from rebranding DEI as something like “sensibility training,” as Ehardt put it.
Well, yeah, said Toews. “The goal is to be so specific that it doesn’t matter what you call it.”
But Toews’ bill is not just a thesaurus. Its enforcement language is where the action is — and where you should keep your eye on the ball.
Toews leans on a familiar mechanism: a “private cause of action” that would allow students, alumni and staff to seek damages if a college or university violates the law. This is no new idea. For instance, the 2024 law cracking down on libraries contains a private cause of action.
The bill also would authorize the attorney general to root out violations and seek civil penalties of up to 2% — essentially allowing the a.g. to act as a 21st member of the Legislature’s budget-writing Joint Finance-Appropriations Committee.
Toews told the task force he had discussed his bill with Attorney General Raül Labrador’s office, and was told the bill seemed reasonable. “They seemed very willing,” Toews said.
Labrador’s office declined an interview request. The State Board also declined comment on the bill — and how it might align with the board’s new policies on DEI and freedom of expression.
Universities are also keeping quiet.
Idaho State is “reviewing the draft legislation and its impacts,” said Ryan Sargent, the university’s associate vice president for government and community relations. Boise State and the U of I declined comment entirely — stating accurately (and perhaps hopefully) that Toews’ bill is in its infancy.
Indeed it is. Which is why it’s unusual to get an early glimpse of it. Draft bills are exempt from public disclosure until they get an introductory hearing in a standing committee. In this case, Toews’ draft bill is already online.
The task force took Toews’ bill under advisement last week, and will probably meet again next week, said Sen. Todd Lakey, R-Nampa, and Rep. Judy Boyle, R-Midvale, the task force’s co-chairs. But any anti-DEI bill would still have to go through standing committees.
Regardless, the DEI issue isn’t going away this session. There’s no shortage of legislators who will see to that.
On Tuesday morning, Whitworth made his first appearance before JFAC. Rep. Josh Tanner, R-Eagle, used the opportunity to ask if the state will be able to cut higher education budgets because the colleges and universities are closing DEI offices. It doesn’t work that way, because the Legislature has prohibited the universities from spending taxpayer dollars on DEI, forcing them to rely instead on student fees and donations.
And while the debate continues at the Statehouse, the DEI student center shutdowns are having a real impact on campuses. As universities adopt the State Board’s blueprint and open holistic, one-stop support centers, future students won’t know the difference, Whitworth said. But in the transition, he acknowledges that the closures aren’t easy on marginalized student groups. “In the moment … it’s a big change for those students.”
On Friday, a day after the Legislature’s DEI task force meeting, the U of I held a ceremony to mark and mourn the closure of its 52-year-old women’s center. “I don’t think we’re going to know how devastating this is until down the line,” U of I student and work-study staffer Morgan Neville told Emily Pearce of the Moscow-Pullman Daily News. “The impact is going to be felt for a long time.”
But is a shuttered DEI center dead enough to satisfy legislators? It doesn’t look that way.
Kevin Richert writes a weekly analysis on education policy and education politics. Look for his stories each Thursday.
