The Trump EEOC just filed a lawsuit against Washington University in St. Louis over the school’s alleged DEI practices which included separating employees by race for training.
The person who eventually brought the complaint to the EEOC is Amega Thaier. Thaier is black and when she was first contacted by her supervisor about the mandatory training, she raised an issue about separating employees by race.
In June 2024, Fisher emailed the SCC research administration team, including Thaier, that they would participate in two training sessions provided by the Washington University School of Medicine’s Office of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (ODEI) on the topics of “How Racism Harms” and “Anti-Racism Community Discussions”.
Fisher’s email stated that the training sessions were “mandatory for all staff.”
On October 9, 2024, in preparation for the “How Racism Harms” discussion session scheduled for early November 2024, ODEI sent an online survey to the expected participants from the SCC research administration team, which noted that participants “will spend time in shared racial identity spaces” during the session and asked them to self-identify as either White or BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, People of Color).
Thaier, who is Black, selected “BIPOC” as her racial identity and then emailed ODEI staff expressing concern about how “shared racial identity spaces” would work given that she was the only “BIPOC” person on the SCC research administration team.
After exchanging multiple emails with ODEI staff, Thaier understood that she would participate in the “How Racism Harms” training session with the rest of the SCC research administration team, but that there would be no “shared racial identity spaces” activities during the training.
So, problem solved and weirdness averted. That seemed to be the end of it. Except it wasn’t. The training got postponed and then turned into a zoom call.
Thaier accepted the Zoom invitation and joined the January 22, 2025, “How Racism Harms” training session believing, based on her emails with ODEI staff, that the session would not include a “shared racial identity spaces” activity.
During the January 22, 2025, “How Racism Harms” training session, the ODEI facilitator separated the SCC research administration team participants into Zoom breakout rooms for “shared racial identity spaces” based on race.
Despite knowing that Thaier did not want to participate in a “shared racial identity spaces” activity, the ODEI facilitator placed Thaier, the only nonWhite person on the SCC research administration team, in a Zoom room by herself, where she remained alone for several minutes.
Again, the title of this training was “How Racism Harms” and the outcome was the only black employee being told to wait alone so the white employees could participate without her. Did anyone think this through? Understandably, Thaier sent an email to her boss.
“Being the only Black person in the training, I was isolated and put in a position that felt profoundly alienating and cruel. It wasn’t just uncomfortable—it was dehumanizing. In 2025, in this political and social climate, the only black/BIPOC person was literally and figuratively segregated and asked to leave the ‘room.’ It’s egregious.” Thaier reminded them that she had “flagged this issue months ago when the activity was initially scheduled, and the decision was made to avoid it for this exact reason.”
The complaint was escalated to Washington University’s Office of Institutional Equity (OIE). An internal investigation took place and was eventually marked as “resolved” but nothing happened.
In 2025, Thaier continued to get an outstanding performance review but a month later she filed a complaint with the EEOC. The EEOC informed the school the complaint had been filed and just a few months later her supervisors told her to start looking for another job.
On November 12, 2025, Beers told Thaier that there was not enough work for her and that she should begin looking for other opportunities because her position would eventually be eliminated.
The EEOC is basically arguing that this was a retaliation firing. So this looks like another case where DEI training turned into an awkward situation for an employee who was doing well until this happened. The fact that this particular employee is black and ostensibly someone who would benefit from such DEI training being adopted ought to make universities think twice about how helpful this really is.
Editor’s Note: President Trump is fighting to ensure America’s kids get the education they deserve.
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