The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) has launched an investigation into Nike’s hiring practices due to allegations of discrimination against white employees.
America First Legal (AFL) filed a civil rights complaint against Nike with the EEOC in 2024.
“The Company’s ‘2025 Targets Summary’ reveals that Nike appears to use numerical quotas for hiring, training, and promotion,” according to AFL. “For example, by 2025 Nike aims to have ‘50% of women in global corporate workforce and 45% in leadership positions.'”
AFL noted that Nike CEO John Donahoe pushed a similar goal in 2021, aiming “to have 30% ‘representation of racial and ethnic minorities at the director level and above in Nike’s U.S. workforce.’”
The EEOC filed a subpoena enforcement action against Nike in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri to compel the company to produce any information regarding the allegations.
Nike received a regular subpoena but did not respond, prompting the EEOC to take the next step.
“When there are compelling indications, including corporate admissions in extensive public materials, that an employer’s Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion-related programs may violate federal prohibitions against race discrimination or other forms of unlawful discrimination, the EEOC will take all necessary steps—including subpoena enforcement actions—to ensure the opportunity to fully and comprehensively investigate,” said EEOC Chair Andrea Lucas.
The EEOC requested documents and information going back to 2018:
Information sought included criteria used in selecting employees for layoffs; information related to the company’s tracking and use of worker race and ethnicity data, including as a factor in setting executive compensation; and information about 16 programs which allegedly provided race-restricted mentoring, leadership, or career development opportunities. When the company failed to produce all the information sought by the subpoena, the agency filed an enforcement action in federal court.
“Title VII’s prohibition of race-based employment discrimination is colorblind and requires the EEOC to protect employees of all races from unlawful employment practices,” added Lucas. “Thanks to President Trump’s commitment to enforcing our nation’s civil rights laws, the EEOC has renewed its focus on evenhanded enforcement of Title VII.”
A Nike spokesperson described the subpoena enforcement as a “surprising and unusual escalation” to Axios.
“We have had extensive, good-faith participation in an EEOC inquiry into our personnel practices, programs, and decisions and have had ongoing efforts to provide information and engage constructively with the agency,” said the spokesperson. “We have shared thousands of pages of information and detailed written responses to the EEOC’s inquiry and are in the process of providing additional information.”
[Featured image via YouTube]
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