De-Woking the Air Force Academy Must Be a Major Focus for the Trump Administration
Under Joe Biden, the academy suffered decline and redirection into pushing woke politics instead of preparing the next generation of warfighters.
Cross-posted from our latest project, RestoretheMilitary.com, where we're exposing the woke officers pushing DEI, Critical Race Theory, and transgenderism on our troops
Credit the U.S. Air Force Academy for making great strides towards undoing the damage inflicted by four years of Democrat rule under Joe Biden. But there’s plenty more work to be done before it’s truly back on track.
Academy Superintendent Lt. Gen. Tony Bauernfeind has purged classes teaching Critical Race Theory and DEI per President Trump’s order, removing one of the worst obstacles toward creating a unified fighting force. “We’re delving in hard on teaching our future leaders how to think and not what to think,” he announced.
But a December 2024 lawsuit by Students for Fair Admissions points out that the academy continued to use race as a criterion for admitting cadets under Bauernfeind’s leadership—a policy that only changed in April when Air Force command issued a memorandum eliminating all consideration of sex, race, or ethnicity.
In other words, the Air Force Academy leadership only ceased its divisive Affirmative Action policies because of a Trump administration directive—and that ought to concern a nation threatened by a belligerent China.
America’s five service academies are charged with preparing the next generation of officers for the challenges of combat and command. There is no place for political indoctrination, particularly when it comes at the cost of re-warriorizing America’s military culture. Instead, the Air Force Academy spent much of the past four years focused promoting woke politics.
In February 2024, the academy featured a far-left activist, Bryan Stevenson, as the keynote speaker for its National Character and Leadership Development Symposium. Stevenson is the founder of the Equal Justice Initiative, a pro-Black Lives Matter group that lobbies against the death penalty for murderers and mandatory-minimum sentencing for drug offenses. The group is heavily funded by George Soros’ Open Society Foundations and other far-left donors.
Stevenson’s address on the importance of “identity” blasted cadets to do what is “uncomfortable and inconvenient” in the name of social justice. He was later hailed by academy Director of Staff Gail Colvin, who echoed him: “Mr. Stevenson leads with action standing for what’s right, even if it is uncomfortable or inconvenient.”
Colvin herself has advocated for “diversity” in admissions since at least 2007, when she launched a “youth diversity outreach program.” In 2020, Colvin used an annual Board of Visitors meeting to hail the academy’s Racial Review Committee following the George Floyd “Summer of Love” race riots in earlier that year.
“She [Colvin] said the Academy has initiated several programs to further study the issue, including listening sessions among minority cadets and a survey of the Cadet Wing related to their perceptions of diversity and inclusion. Committee members have also reviewed ‘artifacts’ at the Academy to increase diversity in the images that are displayed throughout the institution.”
The Air Force Academy’s glut of civilian professors—there are nearly 190 civilian staff on-campus—have further contributed to the woke penetration into curricula. Professor Cassandra Benson reportedly chided her students as “White Boy 1, 2, 3,” saying “All you white boys look alike.”
Another female instructor reportedly asked the white male students in her class to state examples of their “white privilege” to fellow cadets.
Associate Professor Lynne Chandler Garcia championed teaching cadets Critical Race Theory in a Washington Post op-ed. “Racism was ingrained in the system from the beginning,” Garcia argued of the Air Force, U.S. Armed Forces, and America as a whole.
Garcia even defended the shameful behavior of Mark Milley, the discredited ex-general who held secret calls with Communist China pledging to warn the hostile country “if the U.S. ever planned to attack.” Milley’s own defense of Critical Race Theory hinged on his close reading of Karl Marx and confessed desire to “understand white rage.”
Our military is not a petri dish for the Left’s hateful and twisted social experiments. Nor is it the domain of Democrat-appointed commissars to berate our troops into political correctness. As President Trump and Defense Sec. Pete Hegseth work to de-woke these critical institutions, they must do so with the larger goal of transforming military culture into one which rewards real warriors—not social justice warriors.
We're naming names and charting a path for a 21st century military at RestoretheMilitary.com—check it out today
