Opinion | We all know what “DEI hire” really means

“DEI hire” means the n-word. 

Let’s stop beating around the bush. Let’s stop talking in riddles. Let’s stop being cowards. 

When you proclaim that so-and-so is a “DEI hire,” you’re basically using a racial slur. You’re saying, without really saying, that that person is somehow lesser because of their skin color, but that their skin color – along with the noble ambition of diversity, equity and inclusion – was responsible for them landing the job, role or attention. 

Don’t run from it. Don’t deny it. We all know it’s true. 

And here’s how we know: Y’all keep calling Vice President Kamala Harris a “DEI hire.” 

That’s the big knock on her. She’s not a serious candidate for president, just another one of those “DEI hire” women. Hell, she hasn’t even had children, so she’s technically a DEI catlady, to borrow the parlance of the super likable Republican VP nominee. 

So, let’s lay this out. 

Harris is an unqualified “DEI hire.” Donald Trump is a deserving, qualified presidential candidate. 

Harris, an attorney, who worked as the District Attorney of San Francisco, the California Attorney General, a U.S. Senator and the Vice President of the United States, is the DEI hire. 

But the guy who was born on third base, blew through hundreds of millions of dollars of his family’s money, declared bankruptcy multiple times, has been rightfully convicted of 34 felonies, failed at almost every business venture in which he was the majority owner and whose sole claim of success – and the venture that bailed him out – was a reality TV show in which he hired and fired people to run fake businesses, is the “qualified candidate”? 

Man, stop it. 

The only way Kamala Harris isn’t more qualified than Donald Trump is if you believe Black people are inherently less qualified.

The end.

And that’s what you mean when you keep repeating the “DEI hire” line – that Black people are lesser. That they’re not as smart. That they’re less qualified than even vastly less accomplished white people. 

If we’re being honest and fair – and we’re removing race from the equation – Trump isn’t in the same galaxy as Kamala Harris when it comes to the qualifications necessary to hold the position of leader of the free world. And the only reason anyone would ever believe that he is as qualified, much less more qualified, is because we’ve been conditioned in this country to value white people’s accomplishments more, even when they’re mostly fiction. 

There’s a term for it: White privilege. 

Now, I know that freaks out a lot of people, who believe it devalues any hard work and accomplishments of white people, but that’s simply what the mediocre privileged want you to believe. They need you to be outraged at the notion that Black people in this country face obstacles that white people don’t, not least of which is a virtual void of heritage wealth. 

If you doubt this, please, find me the multiple examples of Black people you know who inherited their wealth, college admission and/or professional status from their long lineage of successful family members. I’ll clean out my inbox in anticipation. 

I suspect that inbox will be clean as a whistle for a long time. 

But the hypocrisy doesn’t stop there. It also extends to failures. The failures of Black people, especially those in the spotlight, are held up and mocked, used to castigate the entire race, used to disqualify without question from professional positions. 

Doubt it? 

Then answer this honestly: What would people say of Kamala Harris if she were a thrice married, 34-time felon who paid off a porn star to hide an affair, bankrupted multiple companies, ran a fake university that cheated students, cheated nonprofits out of buckets of cash, said out loud that she wanted to be a dictator for just a day or that Democrats only need to vote one more time and then never have to worry about it again? 

That Black person couldn’t get hired to work at Jack’s. The comparable white guy is the Republican nominee – the guy who convinced thousands to participate in an actual coup. 

Which might just be the best argument for DEI to come along. If the Republican Party actually embraced diversity, equity and inclusion, maybe it wouldn’t be stuck with such an awful candidate.