Illustration take from [@rickmckeetons] (https://www.instagram.com/rickmckeetoons/p/DE5Aaj-OVaS/) on Instagram

It is raining Executive Orders (EOs) all over the United States. Printed media, radio, TV, commercials on Spotify: they all churn news around the clock about the latest EOs of President Donald Trump.

It started on inauguration day when he walked into the Oval Office with his brand new golden pen uncapped, ready to sign and sign. Since then, Jan. 20, 2025, his administration has released 76 EOs. For comparison, in all four years of Biden’s presidency, 162 EOs were released, averaging 41 per year. During his previous tenure, Trump released a total of 220, meaning 55 per year. The record holder for the most EOs is President Franklin D. Roosevelt, with 3721 or 307 annually. It is important to note that Roosevelt served the longest presidency in U.S. history during World War II.

But numbers alone do not capture the weight of Trump’s actions. An executive order is “a directive from the President that has much of the same power as a federal law,” as defined by the National Constitution Center. Panic may ensue now, and appropriately so. One of Trump’s first and most contentious EOs – which also functions as de facto law – is the “Protecting Civil Rights and Expanding Individual Opportunity” order, which terminates Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion practices across federal organizations. While the immediate impacts of this EO may not seem as drastic as others – such as those on migrants or imposing higher tariffs – the ramifications for higher education are becoming undeniable.

DEI is, or perhaps was, a framework used by U.S. institutions to ensure access and representation for minority and historically disadvantaged groups, including Native Americans, Latino and Black citizens, immigrants, and women. At universities, DEI practices have been integrated from pre-admission marketing through senior decision-making. Trump claims that DEI unfairly advantages certain people, which he believes undermines democratic processes. This argument fundamentally misunderstands the role of DEI frameworks, which aim to address the inherent inequalities and biases in our societies, helping decision-makers consider a person’s full history beyond just their resume. While some institutions used quotas to boost diversity, they remain exceptions, not the rule..

The EO has led to the removal of DEI-related content from federal webpages,, changing inclusive language to strictly binary terms. Some of the keywords identified as unlawful under the EO were “pregnant people,” “women in leadership,” and of course the terms “diversity,” “equity,” and “inclusion.” These are seen as denominators of what Trump defines as “woke” culture.

The impact extends to federally funded research, where delays in funding approval are disrupting progress in fields from anthropology and history to medicine and engineering. Researchers who have already received diversity-based funding are afraid it will be revoked, ultimately leaving them vulnerable to suspensions or losing their jobs altogether.

Some educational institutions were slower to comply, prompting Trump to issue an ultimatum with a deadline for compliance. Eliminating DEI from schools also entails excluding certain topics like race theory from the curriculum or potentially closing programs in African-American Studies or Gender Studies. Fields like Environmental Studies/Engineering or any other climate/climate-change-related research are also at risk.

These EOs have little to do with “wokeness” and everything to do with establishing control over knowledge and knowledge generation. What this education crisis reveals is how unnecessarily and dangerously intertwined science and the government have become. Federal funding has been vital for groundbreaking research in numerous fields, but now, this research is being jeopardized by political ideologies. Frameworks like DEI sought to mitigate the harmful effects of such shifts in power. Censorship undermines the public interest. Marginalization, exclusion, and oppression never serve the public good. Trump’s anti-DEI stance is not helping anybody, not even his electorate.

Educational institutions, especially universities as powerhouses of knowledge generation and archiving, need to fight back with all they have up their sleeves and behind their backs. They should be supported by federal courts, which have already found key elements of this anti-DEI EO to be unconstitutional. This battle is far from over.

But how will this affect NYU?

While many universities have started to push back, NYU has a tendency to “comply with the law.” This was President Linda Mills’s response to action taken by students and faculty against another EO regarding the status of foreign nationals in the U.S.

Following the release of the immigration EO, an NYU parent took to Facebook to call for action against students who had participated in recent divestment protests. Soon after, the parent revealed that President Mills was in contact with them the entire time. As the only EO the school has given a response to, we could use this to extrapolate what a response to the DEI measures would be.

The response might be the fact that NYU Langone has turned away patients who had scheduled appointments prior to the EO’s release, which the hospital now sees are no longer in alignment with their practice. The response might be that, if it were not for students and faculty reading the room, governmental agencies would still have been invited to career fairs and given access to campus grounds at such a sensitive and precarious time.

It feels as if NYU students carry targets on their backs, placed there by their own alma mater. The campus atmosphere no longer feels safe and, hence, conducive to fruitful learning. Academic freedom seems more fictitious than before, and counting to 10 and looking around oneself before participating in class is the new normal. Faculty remain dedicated to making sure the classrooms are spaces of open and challenging discussions, but what happens beyond is out of their control. What assurances do students have that if they express pro-DEI sentiments in class that would not put them at risk outside the door? None.

For an institution with campuses around the globe that aims to promote cosmopolitanism and international cooperation, we see very little action to further or protect this mission - with NYU Abu Dhabi possibly being the exception. This pivotal moment in U.S. politics opens an opportunity for American universities overseas to take the lead. NYUAD, in particular, has the potential to take up the NYU mission of raising generations of “global leaders” and really delivering on it.

NYUAD already has a legacy of being one of the most diverse universities in the world. It serves as a safe haven for international students to pursue lucrative degrees with a liberal arts curriculum. Additionally, it offers more financial aid support than the majority of other American universities, meaning it is not only culturally but also economically diverse. At a time when commitment to equity and diversity is questioned, NYUAD’s continued dedication to upholding high standards of DEI practices would go a long way. Our administration now has an opportunity to pioneer new forms of DEI – also called ‘Inclusion, Diversity, Belonging and Equity’ (IDBE) on our campus – practices which would allow us to truly embrace that “best of both worlds” approach to higher education: leading yet accessible.

Now is the time to enhance programs on climate and gender studies at NYUAD. Our location in the UAE gives us the unique opportunity to study the extremes of climate change and explore environmentally friendly adaptation practices. Through interdisciplinary research, we can address the effects of climate on underrepresented populations from the Middle East and Southeast Asia. The addition of gender studies to the curriculum has offered more opportunities to celebrate the achievements of women in male-dominated fields, and to hopefully further the study of the economic aspects of gender – especially with Stern now on campus – and explore the processes of gender-based marginalization and its opposition.

Existing research that specifically addresses DEI/IDBE issues should also receive greater institutional support.

Now, more than ever, it is crucial for NYUAD to establish a niche for itself in which the values of inclusion and diversity are not just included in discussions and papers but are the actual focus. Only through meaningful action and targeted funding can we preserve intentional interdisciplinarity and multicultural knowledge. There is no need for grand ceremonies, only meaningful action. Standing firmly against the global anti-DEI sentiment and exclusionary politics is the only way we can continue to thrive as an institution that is, first and foremost, diverse.