The Trump administration EEOC has targeted sportswear giant Nike, following through on 2024 complaint filed by a Stephen Miller-cofounded group. The administration also targeted 40+ law firms over DEI last week, continuing to weaponize the levers of government as mandated by Project 2025, the blueprint for white Christian nationalist regime change.
By Nancy Levine Stearns | February 5, 2026
The Trump administration has launched an investigation against Nike over DEI (diversity, equity and inclusion), following through on a federal complaint filed by a Stephen Miller-cofounded group in 2024. America First Legal (AFL), cofounded by Miller, had filed a federal complaint with the EEOC against Nike alleging discrimination against white men.
In a press release titled “America First Legal Slams Nike, Files Federal Civil Rights Complaint for Alleged Racial and Sex Discrimination Against White Males, AFL said the sportswear giant “stresses the importance of an ‘inclusive community’ but fails to include white, straight men in the ‘Employee Networks, collectively known as NikeUNITED.’”
AFL filed a federal civil rights complaint with the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) against Nike, Inc. for alleged racial and sex discrimination in violations in 2024, as part of the group’s “Dismantling Diversity, Equity and Inclusion” initiative.
The group has targeted 45 companies on its “Woke Corporations” list, filing federal complaints and lawsuits since Miller cofounded the group 2021. Private sector entities targeted by AFL include Disney, Mattel, as well as the National Football League (NFL) and San Francisco Forty-Niners, on whose home field the Super Bowl will be played this weekend. (Bad Bunny will perform the halftime show. Trump said he won’t attend.)
Most recently, AFL filed a complaint against publishing giant Penguin Random House in December, claiming discrimination against white employees resulting from the company’s DEI initiatives. Penguin Random House clapped back at the Miller-founded group’s complaint.
Publishers Weekly reported, “A spokesperson for PRH denied that the publisher’s DEI policies run afoul of any laws.” Publishers Weekly noted: “This is not the first time PRH has been targeted by the political right. This fall, President Trump filed a lawsuit against PRH, as well as the New York Times, over its publication of Lucky Loser: How Donald Trump Squandered His Father’s Fortune and Created the Illusion of Success (Penguin Press), which is drawn from the reporting of two Times reporters.”
The Miller-cofounded AFL may act as a feeder system for Trump’s EEOC, starting with Nike. Trump’s EEOC chief Andrea Lucas posted a recruiting ad on X last month: ‘Are you a white male who has experienced discrimination at work based on your race or sex? You may have a claim to recover money under federal civil rights laws.’”
Despite the Trump administration’s war on corporate DEI, investors, boards and CEOs of some of the largest companies in America have insisted that DEI is a business imperative. Shareholders from 32 out of 32 corporations, including Apple, Costco, and Levi’s, voted overwhelming to reject anti-DEI proposals in 2025-6, most by 99 percent of voting shares.
Federal agencies are following Trump’s Executive Order to target DEI in the private sector
Trump and his administration are weaponizing the levers of government to following Project 2025, the Heritage Foundation’s blueprint for white Christian nationalist regime change. The Trump administration’s war on DEI was declared on Day One of his current presidency, with the president issuing an executive order directing federal agencies to target DEI in the private sector. And agency heads, in addition to Lucas, are following his orders.
Last week the FTC (Federal Trade Commission) issued a threat against 40+ law firms, stretching antitrust laws, to target DEI initiatives. Trump’s FTC chief Andrew Ferguson issued a threat letter to more than 40 firms. Most legal experts say the threat is a questionable application of antitrust laws.
Carliss Chatman, professor of law at SMU Dedman School of Law said of the FTC letter in a message to Impactivize: “It’s legally thin based purely on the purpose of antitrust. Antitrust law polices agreements that restrain competition in labor markets, not information-sharing programs that leave firms free to hire, pay, and promote however they choose. The real power of the letter is not in court—it’s in the threat of investigation and the chilling effect on a population that tends to be risk averse.”
Legal experts who spoke with Impactivize tend to agree with Professor Chatman’s analysis. Atinuke Adediran, associate professor of law at Fordham School of Law messaged Impactivize: “Like a lot of the threats this administration puts out there, it’s a legal stretch.”
What’s more, the FTC letter exposes the real motivations of the administration.
Jonathan Feingold, professor of law at Boston University School of Law, told Impactivize in a message: “This move is wholly consistent with the Trump administration’s segregationist desire to employ legal threats to prevent powerful entities from taking modest steps to remedy contemporary inequality and integrate their workforce.”
Project 2025, the 920-page manifesto assembled by the Heritage Foundation, specifically calls for the FTC to target DEI: “there is no ESG [Environment, Social, Governance] loophole in the antitrust laws… The FTC should set up an ESG/DEI collusion taskforce to investigate firms…” (Page 873)
Other Trump admin agencies including the FCC (Federal Communications Commission) and DoJ (Department of Justice) have likewise followed Trump’s order to target DEI in the private sector.
FCC chief Brendan Carr, who authored the Project 2025 chapter about the FCC, blocked acquisition deals of Verizon, T-Mobile and AT&T unless they scrapped their DEI programs. The companies capitulated, and the FCC approved their deals.
Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights at the DoJ Harmeet Dhillon testified to senators at hearing the Senate Judiciary Committee in July last year, saying, “Either DEI will end on its own, or we will kill it.”
The engine driving the war on corporate DEI is the same machinery behind the deployment of ICE militarized forces against U.S. residents.
Stephen Miller is widely considered the architect of the Trump administration’s deployment of militarized immigration (ICE and DHS) forces that are terrorizing residents of U.S. cities, including Minneapolis. Protesters Renee Good and Alex Pretti were shot and murdered by federal agents in Minneapolis last month. Trump administration immigration officials are facing a mountain of growing condemnation. And a new report from Just Security underscores the broad illegality of ICE operations.
With the Miller-cofounded AFL acting as a narc for the EEOC, expect to see additional enforcement actions taken against large corporations over DEI. But with DEI firmly established as a business imperative, as evidenced by data, and reiterated by investors, boards and CEOs, some companies may push back on the Trump’s administration’s ideological war against their businesses.
The Trump admin targeted Nike even though founder Phil Knight is a major Republican donor. Will Nike push back against the Trump administration? As many people are suggesting to them, “Just do it.”