Trump Has More Work to Do Abolishing DEI at the Naval Academy
Annapolis leadership is spending too much time chasing “diversity” quotas and too little preparing for the next major war.
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
Did Vice-Admiral Yvette Davids, superintendent of the U.S. Naval Academy, lie under oath to Congress about using race-based admissions?
Under President Trump and Defense Sec. Pete Hegseth, the Defense Department has made terrific strides toward cleaning up the woke leadership at America’s five service academies. That includes a January 27, 2025 executive order banning the academies from using race-based initiatives.
Admiral Davids deserves to be on the Trump-Hegseth hit list for her track record of pushing racial policies on America’s midshipmen—something she’s since tried to cover up.
On February 14, Davids revised the Naval Academy’s internal guidance to bar admissions officers from using race, ethnicity, or sex as “a factor for admission at any point during the admissions process, including qualification and acceptance.” In other words, ending Affirmative Action.
One month later at a March 26 congressional hearing, Davids testified that “at no time are race, sex, or ethnicity considered in the admissions process” for students applying to Annapolis. She said it twice more, in fact. “We have an incredible system tried and true. No race, sex, or ethnicity goals associated with them,” she told Sen. Ted Budd (R-NC). Then again: “No race, sex, or ethnicity whatsoever governed in the acceptance of who we actually take in.”
If that’s true, then why did Davids feel the need to abolish Affirmative Action admission at Annapolis shortly after Trump took office, then act as if it wasn’t official policy under her command?
In other words, the same superintendent responsible for upholding race-based policies is now boasting about ending them. It’s a smokescreen to protect one of the Navy’s most woke senior officers, and the Trump administration shouldn’t buy it.
The U.S. Supreme Court ruled Affirmative Action is unconstitutional for universities in 2023, a ruling that unfortunately did not extend to military academies. Biden appointed Davids superintendent in January 2024, where she protected Affirmative Action in admissions for another year with no misgivings.
Davids was trumpeted by leftist groups and the Biden Defense Department as the first female and Hispanic superintendent in the academy’s history. Under Biden, civilian professors required midshipmen to state their preferred pronouns, a policy overturned not by not Annapolis but by the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals.
The Naval Academy even employed a Brigade Dignity and Respect Executive Officer to administer its Office of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion.
That’s part of Biden’s 2021 “Diversity and Inclusion Strategic Plan,” which continued under Davids’ authority—and would undoubtedly remain in effect today had Kamala Harris won the presidency in November 2024. Captain James Bates, Annapolis’ deputy superintendent and Davids’ chief of staff, was one of the officers who endorsed the plan.
In the last days of the Biden administration—and just three months prior to Davids’ congressional testimony swearing the academy doesn’t use race in admissions—the U.S. Naval Academy won a major lawsuit upholding its use of race as a criterion for admitting new midshipmen. The Baltimore-based judge who ruled in the academy’s favor was explicit about this:
“At trial, the Court heard testimony that no candidate is admitted based solely on his or her race or ethnicity . . . . Nevertheless, the Naval Academy admits that there are certain points in the admissions process where the Naval Academy may consider race or ethnicity as one of many nondeterminative factors.”
There are four instances where the Naval Academy uses when considering race, the court further explained:
“1) When offering letters of assurance; (2) when deciding between two candidates with very close WPMs for nominations using the “competitive” method, service-connected nominations, and in some circumstances the “principal competitive alternate” method; (3) when extending Superintendent nominations; and (4) when extending offers to additional appointees.”
The superintendent of Annapolis, like the heads of all our service academies, has one job: Preparing the next generation of officers for combat leadership. Vice-Admiral Davids failed that crucial task when by helping the radical Left transform Annapolis into a haven for woke ideology.
Davids demonstrated that failure of judgment by inviting a far-left conspiracy theorist and MSNBC commentator, Ruth Ben-Ghiat, to speak on “what happens to militaries under authoritarian rule” just weeks before the 2024 election—comparing then-candidate Trump to Adolf Hitler and other dictators. Davids only postponed—not cancelled—the event after 16 Members of Congress raised serious concerns.
Experts believe Davids’ behavior may even have violated the Hatch Act, the law preventing federal employees from engaging in political activities while on-duty.
Good officers take responsibility for their failures while in command. It’s time to remove Vice-Admiral Davids from hers—and get the U.S. Naval Academy back on track.
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