Commentary: When Targeting DEI Means Restricting Research and Academics

Liliana M. Garces, Eliza Epstein and Jackie Pedota are co-authors of forthcoming studies, funded by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation and the Trellis Foundation, examining how anti-DEI legislation reshapes institutional life and the production and transfer of knowledge in public universities. Garces currently serves as vice president of research and public impact at the Alliance for Higher Education, where Pedota also serves as a fellow.

The mission of public universities is a sacred one: to advance knowledge for the public good through teaching, research and community engagement. But that mission depends on independence: Faculty and students must have the freedom to ask difficult questions and follow evidence wherever it leads – free from political interference.

While recent federal actions to dictate curriculum, steer research agendas and condition funding have drawn public attention and ire, bans on diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives pose a quieter but equally consequential threat. Though many think these bans focus solely on eliminating student-support policies and admissions and programs, they are also quietly narrowing the scope of what students and communities are allowed to know.

At a public university in Texas, we have been studying how anti-DEI laws operate in practice, focusing on Texas’ Senate Bill 17, which took effect in 2024. S.B. 17, like similar laws in other states, bars public universities from funding a vaguely defined range of DEI activities – such as dedicated offices, mandatory training and race‑ or sex‑based “preferential treatment” – while introducing new compliance, audit and enforcement mechanisms for institutions. The law also explicitly carves out important exceptions for core academic functions, like academic course instruction, scholarly research and the dissemination of academic work.

But what began as an effort to dismantle DEI infrastructure has had cascading effects that limit curriculum and research agendas.

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