President-elect Joe Biden is expected to swiftly reverse an executive order signed by President Trump earlier this year that takes aim at diversity training for government workers by prohibiting the teaching of “divisive concepts.”
Franklin Turner, a government contracting lawyer and partner at McCarter & English LLP, said the order “had an obvious chilling effect” on any training he said “could conceivably come within the target of this order,” noting the “obviously political” language.
Turner said the order, which also moved to establish a hotline through the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs, “encouraged, basically, federal contractor employees to complain to the extent that they saw or that they received training that they think violated the terms of this order.”
Turner said companies were “certainly concerned about” the order, which warned of “sanctions for noncompliance” and possible debarment for contractors.