McDonald’s is the latest business to end several of its “woke” DEI (Diversity, Equity, Inclusion) policies after being investigated and approached by Robby Starbuck, the political commentator and filmmaker from Tennessee announced Monday.
Since June of 2024, Starbuck and his team have worked to expose multiple large American companies that push DEI initiatives in the workplace, often leading the targeted companies to publicly reverse course to avoid or respond to backlash from consumers.
BIG news: @McDonalds is ending a number of woke DEI policies today. Now let me tell you what’s changing and how it happened.
3 days ago I told McDonald’s that I’d be doing a story on woke policies there. Today they’ve announced the following changes:
• Hiring: They will END… pic.twitter.com/bvFglf6pxw
— Robby Starbuck (@robbystarbuck) January 6, 2025
Starbuck announced that America’s largest fast food chain, McDonald’s, was the latest company that would be dropping its “woke” policies after he had reached out to the company’s senior marketing director last week to notify the company that he would be publishing a story about the company’s controversial policies.
McDonald’s released a statement on Monday announcing four changes to its practices: Ending diversity “goals” or quotas for how many individuals of each race they hire; ending its participation in the HRC’s woke Corporate Equality Index scoring system and other third-party surveys; ending its DEI pledge for their supply chain; and rebranding its diversity team to be the Global Inclusion Team.
Noting how he’s “not a fan” of the company’s decision to rebrand its diversity team, Starbuck applauded the company’s commitment to end a number of its other woke policies.
“Is this perfect? No. But you know what, McDonald’s wasn’t the worst to begin with but they were on our list of companies, and there are many companies that we aim to change. We got more done today changing policy than anybody else has, so I’m very proud. In fact, I have to say I’m lovin’ it,” Starbuck said in a post published to X.
Starbuck’s work investigating companies’ DEI policies has since led to changes being made at major companies, including Nissan, Walmart, Lowe’s, John Deere, Ford, Jack Daniels, Tractor Supply, Harley Davidson, and others.
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Kaitlin Housler is a reporter at The Tennessee Star and The Star News Network. Follow Kaitlin on X / Twitter.
Photo “McDonald’s Store” by David Schott. CC BY 2.0.
