A legal group co-founded by top White House aide Stephen Miller has filed a complaint with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, seeking an investigation of the Los Angeles Dodgers‘ diversity, equity and inclusion policies.
The America First Legal complaint, filed on Monday, claims that the Dodgers’ DEI policies “appear to discriminate against employees, or prospective employees, solely because of their skin color or sex.” They cite a reference on the team’s DEI page that outlines recruitment efforts, including “sponsoring programs geared toward women and people of color.”
They also take issue with business resource groups, such as those aimed at Asian professionals and the Black Action Network. Although the complaint acknowledges that the groups “appear to be open for all employees to join,” some of them “appear to provide material employment benefits to employees based on their race, color, sex or national origin.” As an example of the benefits, America First Legal pointed to language describing the Dodgers’ Women’s Opportunity Network, described as offering “a safe and equitable space for women to thrive” and a place to “demonstrate that women add tangible value to the organization’s success.”
The complaint follows an incident on June 19 in which masked agents appeared near one of the Dodgers’s gates to its parking lot. Protesters gathered in the area, and the Los Angeles Police Department arrived at the scene, and the agents left. The Dodgers posted that that morning, “ICE agents came to Dodger Stadium and requested permission to access the parking lots. They were denied entry to the grounds by the organization.”
Immigration and Customs Enforcement denied that its personnel were present, but Department of Homeland Security said that Customs and Border Patrol vehicles were “in the stadium parking lot very briefly, unrelated to any operation or enforcement.”
America First Legal cited the incident in a press release announcing the EEOC complaint. It also pointed to a $1 million contribution the Dodgers made to provide financial assistance to immigrant families of those impacted by the ICE raids.
The Dodgers’ employment page states that it will consider “all applicants without regard to national origin, race, color, religion, age, sex, sexual orientation, disability, military status, citizenship status, pregnancy or related medical conditions, marital status, ancestry-ethnicity or any other characteristic protected by applicable state or federal civil rights law.” But the America First Legal complaint argues that the statement is “contradictory” and that it should “not shield the organization from scrutiny or protect it from liability for discriminating in furtherance of DEI goals.”
The Dodgers have not yet commented on the complaint. Also named is Guggenheim Partners LLC, whose CEO Mark Walter is chairman and controlling owner of the Dodgers.
The Trump administration has targeted DEI programs across the federal government, at universities and even at private corporations. The president’s appointee to lead the FCC, Brendan Carr, has launched investigations of DEI practices at media and communications companies including Comcast and Disney.
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