Tesla and Twitter CEO Elon Musk ripped the Department of Defense on Sunday after it tweeted that “diversity is a strategic imperative.”
The DOD tweeted on Saturday, “Diversity is a strategic imperative critical to mission readiness and accomplishment. We were on site for the 2023 inaugural [Office of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion] Summit as DEIA experts led forums to advance the DEIA and DoD mission — because our people matter.”
Musk responded, “Your strategic imperative is defending the United States.”
Your strategic imperative is defending the United States
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 19, 2023
The summit, according to an earlier tweet, took place February 15-17, and featured “distinguished presenters, renowned experts in government, higher education, business, science, and technology.”
Join the @DoD_ODEI Summit next week, Feb. 15-17, and immerse yourself with distinguished presenters and renowned experts in government, higher education, business, science, and technology.
Register now:https://t.co/n4bLQz45v0 pic.twitter.com/ejlgkG6LAJ
— Department of Defense ?? (@DeptofDefense) February 7, 2023
It is not the first time Musk has rankled the Pentagon, but it is the first time he has taken aim at the Biden Pentagon’s wokeness.
House Republicans are aiming to eliminate costly DEI positions and programs at the DOD.
Rep. Jim Banks (R-IN), a Navy reservist and chairman of the House Armed Services Military Personnel Subcommittee, tweeted in response to DOD’s tweet:
As Chairman of the Military Personnel Subcommittee, ensuring our military is focused on lethality and readiness, NOT wokeness and DEI, is my top priority. https://t.co/fbjqfxbYdy
— Jim Banks (@RepJimBanks) February 19, 2023
Banks has launched the Anti-Woke Caucus, aimed at defunding wokeness at the DOD. He wrote recently in the American Mind:
House Republicans demand defunding wokeness at the Department of Defense and in our education system. Wokeness is especially prevalent and dangerous at universities and in primary schools because the Left recognized students as the most vulnerable and useful targets for indoctrination. The Left has also pushed wokeness in the military. We must wonder what the Left wants to do with an anti-American military? For generations Americans never had to think about the Founders’ warnings about the dangers to civil government by a standing army. This has become an immediate question.
And earlier this year, Rep. Chip Roy (R-TX) proposed a bill to eliminate the positions of Chief Diversity Officer and Senior Advisor for Diversity and Inclusion at the Pentagon, or any similar positions at the DOD, as Breitbart News first reported.
The Biden administration has taken a number of steps to promote DEI, rooted in Marxism, at the DOD.
Early on, the administration created the DOD’s first senior advisor to the defense secretary for diversity and inclusion, and established a “counter-extremism working group” that aimed to root out “extremism” at the DOD. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin also ordered a force-wide day-long stand-down for all units to discuss “extremism.”
After a year’s study, the working group found fewer than 100 instances of extremism in a force of 2.1 million.
The Office of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion, which was created during the Obama administration, has a $6 million budget for 2023.
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