Google ends hiring targets tied to diversity

Google is the latest tech company rethinking how it approaches diversity, equity and inclusion in the workplace as businesses face more political pressure from President Trump to roll back these initiatives.

The search giant will no longer set hiring goals that are tied to improving representation in the company. The move was first reported by the Wall Street Journal on Wednesday.

Following calls for racial justice after the 2020 police killing of George Floyd, Google set a goal of increasing by 30% the proportion of “leadership representation of underrepresented groups” by 2025.

A Google spokesperson confirmed Wednesday it is reevaluating its DEI programs, saying the company is still committed to “creating a workplace where all our employees can succeed and have equal opportunities.”

“We’ve updated our 10-k language to reflect this, and as a federal contractor, our teams are also evaluating changes required following recent court decisions and executive orders on this topic,” a Google spokesperson said in a statement, referring to language it included in an annual report companies must file with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.

Like other companies, Google changed wording in the report, omitting a previous reference to “making diversity, equity, and inclusion part of everything we do.” Tech giants such as Meta and Amazon have also rolled back DEI efforts amid mounting political pressure from Republicans to do so.

Trump signed executive orders to end DEI initiatives in the federal government and for federal contractors, a move criticized by civil rights groups such as the American Civil Liberties Union that say it’s a way to “bully” employers into abandoning efforts to create a more equitable workplace. And after a Supreme Court ruling in June 2023 that changed how universities can use race as a factor in admission decisions, companies have become increasingly wary of considering race in hiring.

In the United States, Google’s workforce is predominantly white or Asian, the company’s 2024 diversity report shows. That year, 5.7% of Google’s U.S. workers were Black, 7.5% were Latino and 0.9% were Native American, while 45.3% were white and 45.7% were Asian.

As of December, Google’s parent company Alphabet had 183,323 employees, according to its annual report filed to the Securities and Exchange Commission.