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In the last two years has DEI and the administrative state been clobbered Thought for 20s Yes — both have faced major, deliberate reductions over the past ~22 months (roughly since the start of the second Trump administration in January 2025), with DEI hit harder and more explicitly than the broader administrative state.DEIThe Trump administration made ending federal DEI a day-one priority and has continued pressing it across government, contracting, education, and (via pressure and investigations) the private sector. whitehouse.gov Key actions include:Multiple executive orders and memoranda terminating DEI offices, programs, preferences, and related Biden-era policies across federal agencies. The White House has highlighted 17 such actions and declared “DEI is dead.” Large reported cuts: the administration claims roughly $7.3 billion in DEI spending cut or canceled and $29.4 billion frozen or under review, plus hundreds of millions in settlements or recoveries from universities and companies. Specific examples include over $600 million cut from Education Department DEI-related teacher training grants and other equity programs. whitehouse.gov Education Department actions under Secretary Linda McMahon, including removal of DEI materials, grant cancellations, and related policy reversals. Pressure on federal contractors and grant recipients (via executive orders and DOJ scrutiny) that has driven widespread private-sector pullbacks. Companies such as Deloitte, Target, Walmart, Goldman Sachs, T-Mobile, and others scaled back or ended DEI goals, reporting, and programming. Many universities shuttered DEI offices or centers. hotpaths.com Federal workforce impacts: DEI-related roles and offices were among the first targets of DOGE-driven reductions. Overall federal civilian separations have been large (hundreds of thousands via resignations, early retirements, and firings). There has been legal pushback and incomplete implementation in places. Some guidance was abandoned or modified after court challenges, and not every private entity fully complied. Critics describe the changes as a broad rollback of equity efforts rather than purely anti-discrimination measures. Still, the scale of formal federal dismantling and the private-sector response has been substantial and rapid compared with prior periods.Administrative stateEfforts to constrain and shrink the bureaucracy have also been aggressive, though the results are more mixed and contested than on DEI.Main developments:DOGE (Department of Government Efficiency) and related executive orders drove workforce reductions, contract terminations, agency consolidations, and elimination of certain non-statutory functions. Reports cite large numbers of separations (e.g., 420,000+ by mid-2026 in some tallies) and deep cuts at specific agencies such as HHS. kff.org Revival and implementation of a Schedule F-style system (Schedule Policy/Career). This reclassifies thousands of policy-influencing career officials, reducing traditional civil-service protections and making them easier to remove. Deregulatory actions leveraging the 2024 Loper Bright Supreme Court decision (which ended Chevron deference). The administration has issued executive directives to rescind rules lacking the “best reading” of statutory authority and claims hundreds of deregulatory actions in 2025. The Congressional Review Act has also been used repeatedly to nullify late Biden-era rules (23+ in the second term by spring 2026). realclearpolicy.com Additional orders on reducing bureaucracy, consolidating procurement, streamlining permitting (e.g., NEPA), and targeting specific agencies or programs. Limitations exist: many actions face lawsuits; some fast-track deregulation strategies saw limited uptake; overall federal employment reductions, while large, have been smaller than the most ambitious rhetoric in certain analyses; and future administrations can reverse many personnel and regulatory changes. The administrative state has not been dismantled, but it has faced sustained pressure on size, personnel protections, and regulatory authority that is historically significant.In short, DEI has been systematically targeted and largely dismantled inside the federal government, with clear downstream effects on contractors, universities, and many companies. The administrative state has been meaningfully constrained through workforce cuts, personnel reclassification, and post-Loper Bright deregulation, though the transformation is incomplete and reversible. Both shifts accelerated sharply after January 2025.