End of the Rainbow?

Anti-DEI and anti-LGBTQ+ legislation passed in states like Texas and Florida is tied to a national trend of trying to make LGBTQ+ people and people of color invisible and more easily discriminated against, says Imani Rupert-Gordon, executive director of the National Center for Lesbian Rights.

Imani Rupert-Gordon“All students deserve to have places of support on the campuses where they are investing in their education and preparing for their futures, and this includes LGBTQ+ students and students of color,” says Rupert-Gordon. “We are increasingly concerned that this trend will have a chilling effect across more campuses if these laws spread to other states.”

Florida’s Senate Bill 266 took effect on July 1, 2023, prohibiting specified educational institutions from expending funds for certain purposes. It seeks to prohibit any state or federal funding from being utilized to support diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs at the state’s higher education institutions. The University of North Florida (UNF), by example, has shuttered several on-campus centers, including the LGBTQ Center.

In Texas, Senate Bill 17 took effect on Jan. 1, 2024. Under this law, public institutions of higher education cannot engage in DEI activities. The University of Texas at Austin closed its Gender and Sexuality Center, transferring some of its activities and services to the university’s Women’s Community Center, which UT then closed in May.

“It really is a structural erasure of queer and trans individuals,” says Dr. Ángel de Jesús González, an assistant professor of higher education administration and leadership at Fresno State. “These spaces were created out of a demand to recognize our existence in these spaces, to serve us, provide us the resources that we need to be successful in our educational trajectories, and, in doing so, be successful overall. Now, we’re seeing it being targeted through multiple avenues.”

Dr. Ángel de Jesús GonzálezImpact