Robby Starbuck: the activist pushing US companies to ditch their DEI vows

https://www.ft.com/content/0c8974ee-60bf-4edb-839c-bc24b8ecbc81

Conservatives looking to reverse corporate America’s commitment to 
diversity, equity and inclusion have found a champion in Robby Starbuck, 
a filmmaker, influencer and “anti-woke” activist.Though investors, 
Republican state attorneys-general and litigators have long pressured 
companies to abandon policies designed to diversify their workforces and 
support gay rights, few have had as much success as Starbuck.Ford, 
Lowe’s, Harley-Davidson and tractor maker Deere & Co are among the 
companies to announce they would end some diversity work after being 
targeted by Starbuck for consumer boycotts. 

This week they were joined by Molson Coors, the brewer.“The situation 
these companies are facing is a very different new world where I have a 
direct line to a sizeable portion of their customers,” Starbuck told the 
Financial Times. 

“These customers are engaged and they now understand something very 
important: their wallets are a weapon.”All of the companies Starbuck has 
contacted about their DEI policies told him they would make changes, 
including retailer Tractor Supply and Jack Daniel’s whiskey maker Brown-
Forman, he said.

Although the 35-year-old activist says he is pushing corporate America 
to be politically neutral, he has advocated for right-wing causes where 
he lives in Franklin, Tennessee, just outside Nashville.He campaigned 
against Covid-19 mask and vaccine mandates during the height of the 
pandemic and made a film opposing gender-affirming care called The War 
on Children with his wife, Landon. 

Elon Musk and Donald Trump Jr promoted the project, which faced 
controversy for its allegedly misleading production tactics. As a 
corporate activist, Starbuck gathers tips on companies’ diversity 
efforts from his 600,000 followers on X and researches them with the 
help of two employees. They study a brand’s customers, executives and 
directors to identify one that may be “primed” for change, Starbuck 
said. 

He uses revenue from his social media pages to fund the operation. “The 
reason [corporations] adopted a lot of the far-left, woke policies is 
because a very small, loud [group] of people were there and they were 
putting pressure on these companies . . . saying, you need to do this, 
that and the other thing or you’re racist, or you’re homophobic,” 
Starbuck said. 

“We were perfectly happy being a silent majority. Well, that’s not OK.”

He began by targeting companies he thought relied heavily on 
conservative consumers. But he has turned his attention to what he calls 
“50-50 jump ball companies” — those whose customer base could swing 
either conservative or liberal, in reference to the moment at the start 
of basketball games where two players jump for the ball.

The first company in that category that Starbuck targeted was Lowe’s. He 
shared videos explaining the home improvement retailer’s DEI efforts and 
asked his largely conservative followers to boycott them. The company’s 
rival Home Depot is next on his list. 

Starbuck has a simple explanation for how he became more influential 
than many more experienced and better resourced shareholder activists: 
“The truth is, they don’t know how to communicate in the same way we 
do.”“I think that I can put together a puzzle that makes sense to people 
and that they can relate to in their life,” Starbuck said. 

“You know, when I talk about somebody being afraid to say anything about 
how they feel at work because they’re afraid they’re going to lose their 
job, that connects with somebody a hell of a lot more than a shareholder 
proposal does.”Farming retailer Tractor Supply said in July that it had 
“heard from our customers that we have disappointed them”, and pledged 
to “retire” its current diversity goals and climate pledges. 

Weeks later, John Deere said it would ensure that “socially motivated 
messages” were absent from its internal policies.

Since then, Harley-Davidson has cited “negativity on social media” in 
announcing it was ending its DEI function and affiliations with LGBT+ 
advocacy groups, while Brown-Forman has said it would no longer link 
executive compensation to progress on diversity.

Lowe’s announced it would stop participating in surveys from the LGBT+ 
advocacy group Human Rights Campaign and restructure its employee 
resource groups, although it said these changes had been discussed 
internally before it received messages from Starbuck.Ford has also 
withdrawn from the HRC’s workplace rankings and said it had “taken a 
fresh look at our policies and practices to ensure they support our 
values, drive business results, and take into account the current 
landscape”.

On Tuesday, Molson Coors said it would also stop taking part in the 
HRC’s rankings and drop its supplier diversity goals.“The driving force 
behind this shift was the understanding that when all our people know 
they are welcome, they are more engaged, motivated and committed to our 
company’s collective success,” the brewer said in an email to employees.

Starbuck’s boycotts come amid a broader re-evaluation of the role 
companies should play in America’s culture wars.Corporate DEI 
initiatives such as anti-bias training, recruiting outreach strategies 
and sponsorships of civil rights groups multiplied after a Minneapolis 
police officer murdered George Floyd in 2020.Polling conducted in July 
by Morning Consult found that a majority of US adults still support 
corporate DEI programmes, with 57 per cent approving of efforts to 
recruit from minority groups. 

But men and Republicans are most likely to disapprove, the pollsters 
found, and such initiatives are facing growing political pressure.

“DEI is on shaky legs,” said Emma Obanye, a DEI advocate who is also the 
chief executive of OneTech, a support programme for entrepreneurs from 
minority backgrounds. 

“So really, it’s a case of going back to the drawing board and shoring 
up the things that make sense and getting rid of the things that don’t 
make sense.

”Diversity advocates say the types of initiatives Starbuck has succeeded 
in rolling back, such as relationships with LGBT+ advocacy groups and 
employee resource groups, are not as effective in boosting workplace 
equity as measures such as pay and promotion audits.

“Starbuck is testing the robustness of these policies and we’re seeing 
which companies have just paid lip service to these real issues,” said 
Obanye. “That says a lot more about the companies than Starbuck.

”Kelley Robinson, the president of Human Rights Campaign, said after 
Ford decided to end its partnership with the organisation that she 
“could not be more disappointed” and called Starbuck an “internet 
troll”.

Starbuck, however, said he would keep pushing to get corporate America 
and school systems to withdraw from “social justice fights”.“If we could 
make both of those places just neutral ground where people can just 
exist and they don’t have to have ideology shoved down their throat that 
they disagree with . . . I think that everybody would benefit from 
that,” he said, “and maybe people would treat each other a little bit 
better”.

Meet Kelley Robinson

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285%29_20241007171404226838.png?auto=format&crop=faces&fit=crop&h=
494.24083769633506&w=944


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