REPORT: Intersectionality

Executive summary

What Is “Intersectionality” and Why Is It Dangerous?

The term “intersectionality” encompasses both a theoretical construct and its resulting practices. On a theoretical level, it emphasizes the intersection, i.e., the converging points of perceived victimhood categories with the ostensible goal to remedy past oppression and discrimination. In practice, it justifies the preferential treatment of people who belong to one or more “marginalized” categories regardless of individual merit and conduct. In addition to excusing the disadvantaging of those viewed as “privileged,” intersectionality has also opened the door to other detrimental, even violent, treatment of those viewed as “oppressors.” If it is not stopped, this dangerous, anti-American ideology threatens to become ever more entrenched and extreme.

For decades, intersectionality has been the dominant ideology in higher education. It is now also firmly established in K-12 education, politics, pop culture, and mainstream media. This has resulted in widespread practical applications, which have created novel, rapidly proliferating forms of unlawful discrimination.

Intersectionality grew out of modern anti-Western ideologies, including critical theory, and was a theoretical foundation for widespread development and implementation of critical race theory (CRT). CRT views Western civilization, and the United States in particular, as an incurable and uniquely flawed system of oppression. These ideologies have engendered discriminatory practices, such as the pervasive policies promoting Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI). The deeper philosophical roots of intersectionality lie in the collectivist emphasis on group identity versus individual worth and rights.

While intersectionality derives from, and closely resembles, the above-mentioned ideologies and practices, it constitutes an amplified and broader danger that unites otherwise discrepant social groups around an anti-democratic agenda to destroy Western society. Proponents of intersectionality have been largely unconstrained in their efforts to apply it throughout the culture, in academia, the workplace, in the streets, etc.

Administrative Efforts Thus Far to Address These Discriminatory Ideologies

Efforts by the administration to address these discriminatory ideologies are laudable. See, for example:

• Executive Order 14173, Ending Illegal Discrimination and Restoring Merit-Based Opportunity, explains the administration’s commitment to civil rights laws prohibiting discrimination and its opposition to illegal group-based preferences under the guise of DEI.
  
• Executive Order 14190, Ending Radical Indoctrination in K-12 Schooling, articulates an intention to protect American children from “anti-American, subversive, harmful, and false ideologies,” including “discriminatory equity ideology.”
  
• The administration’s budget request for fiscal year 2026 included a section on Defunding the Harmful Woke, Marxist Agenda which ends funding for advancing DEI and other radical, harmful ideologies such as “intersectionality” and “racial equity” (as opposed to racial equality).
  
• The Department of Justice’s Guidance for Recipients of Federal Funding Regarding Unlawful Discrimination requires, consistent with existing law, that entities which receive federal funding ensure they “do not discriminate on the basis of race, color, national origin, sex, religion, or other protected characteristics – no matter the program’s labels, objectives, or intentions.” In particular, this Guidance identifies that the “use of terms such as ‘DEI,’ ‘Equity,’ or other euphemistic terms does not excuse unlawful discrimination or absolve parties from scrutiny regarding potential violations.”

The Administration’s Efforts Are Being Flouted

• Despite the administration’s (and some states’) efforts to stop unlawful discrimination, there are multiple examples of institutions, such as universities, flouting these initiatives. These include, for example, over 750 programs and scholarships challenged by LIF’s Equal Protection Project. Such discriminatory programs include:
  
• DACA/undocumented programs operating at 138 colleges and universities in the California system, which discriminate against American-born students;
  
• a fellowship program excluding white faculty members at twenty New England universities;
  
• “womxn”-only graduate programs at Massachusetts Institute of Technology; and
  
• Department of Health and Human Services grant programs with racial and ethnic discriminatory eligibility criteria.

According to recordings exposed in January 2026, staff at universities in Arizona11 and Florida admitted on camera that DEI instruction and initiatives were continuing but were being concealed through rebranding.

Consistent with and in furtherance of the administration’s efforts to stop unlawful DEI-based discrimination, the government must take additional steps to educate the public and to enshrine

Intersectionality: Report and Recommendations information and constraints on intersectionality in the public record, government policy, guidance, laws, etc. This includes articulating intersectionality’s foundation, how it functions, how it violates civil rights laws, and its danger to American values, cohesion, and safety.

Recommended Steps to Address the Harms of Intersectionality

Addressing these harms will require a multi-pronged approach from Members of Congress, the presidential administration, states, and non-governmental entities committed to ending discriminatory programs and practices at educational and other institutions, including the following:

• issuing executive orders and/or administrative guidance defining and targeting intersectionality as a threat to American civil rights laws, values, and cohesion;
  
• initiating lawsuits against discriminatory practices based on race, gender, religion, sexuality, and other intersectional factors;
  
• withholding government funding from institutions that violate the law by engaging in intersectional discrimination;
  
• directing federal funding only toward projects and programs that produce nationally useful and meritorious research and education;
  
• holding congressional hearings to consider legislation addressing funding criteria and to educate the public, lawmakers, and policymakers about the harms of unlawful application of intersectional theory; and
  
• codifying into law executive orders that make clear laws prohibiting discrimination on the basis of protected characteristics do not permit intersectional discrimination on those same bases.