Walmart CEO Addresses Rollback of DEI Programs: ‘Will Continue to Make the Best Decisions We Can’

Walmart US CEO and President John Furner spoke about the company’s decision to roll back its diversity, equity and inclusion “DEI” programs and policies in a new interview on Tuesday.

The retail giant stayed the latest The US company is to scale back its DEI initiatives this week, following similar moves this year from such big names as Harley-Davidson, John Deere and Tractor Supply.

Commenting on the policy changes on “CBS Mornings” Tuesday, Furner said the company wants to make sure everyone “feels like they belong.”

“Like many companies across the United States, we’ve been on a journey,” Furner said. “We’re going to continue to be on a journey. And what we’re trying to do is make sure that every customer, every employee feels welcome here in the store and feels like they belong.”

Walmart U.S. President and CEO John Furner addresses the company’s rollback of DEI policies on “CBS Mornings.” (CBS/screenshot)

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“At the beginning of 2023, we started talking about belonging. We’re going to continue to make the best decisions we can that make everyone, our customers, our employees, feel like this is an environment they can act in and thrive in,” he continued.

Furner also told CBS that the company would “continue” to value its small business suppliers.

Walmart, the nation’s largest retailer and private employer, confirmed the company would make a number of changes, including removing sexual and transgender products from third-party merchants that are inappropriately marketed to children from its online marketplace.

It would also stop funding the Center for Racial Equity, a nonprofit that Walmart launched in 2020 as a five-year initiative, and would drop the terms “LatinX” and “DEI” entirely in official communications.

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A worker walks through the aisles of a Walmart Supercenter on February 20, 2024 in Hallandale Beach, Florida. (Joe Raedle/Getty Images/Getty Images)

The company will also review its grants, particularly for community events, to ensure they remain an appropriate environment for children. However, the company will continue to support LGBTQ Pride celebrations.

Walmart will also no longer participate in the Human Rights Campaign Corporate Equality Index, a report that rates American companies on their policies toward LGBTQ employees.

Conservative activist and filmmaker Robby Starbuck, who has led a campaign exposing the vigilante politics of big business, took a victory lap Monday after Walmart’s announced changes.

Starbuck interjected a post on X that he had warned Walmart executives last week that he would publish a story about the company’s “awakening.”

“Instead,” he said, “we had productive conversations to find solutions.”

“Our campaigns are now so effective that we’re getting the biggest companies on earth to change their policies without me even posting a story detailing their woke policies,” Starbuck wrote. “Corporate America can clearly see that America wants normalcy back. The era of vigilantism is dying right before our eyes. The landscape of corporate America is rapidly shifting to sanity and neutrality. We are now the trend, not the anomaly. We are winning and one by one we WILL bring sanity back to corporate America.”

Walmart’s logo is seen outside one of its stores in Chicago, Illinois, U.S., November 20, 2018. REUTERS/Kamil Krzaczynski/File Photo (REUTERS/Kamil Krzaczynski/File Photo/Reuters Photos)

Walmart confirmed it was notified of the activist’s story last week, but said these policy changes have been in the works for the past few years and were not a result of their conversation with Starbuck.

Fox News’ Breck Dumas and Daniella Genovese contributed to this article.

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