00:00When the red light comes on, your five minutes has expired, and we ask that you please wrap
00:04up.
00:05I now recognize General Rokita for his opening statement.
00:09Thank you, Chair Comer, Ranking Member Ocasio-Cortez, and members of the committee for inviting
00:13me to speak here today.
00:14It's good to see you.
00:16My name is Todd Rokita, and I serve as the Attorney General for the State of Indiana,
00:20an office where I manage over 400 employees.
00:24And prior to serving as Indiana's Chief Legal Officer, I spent several years in the private
00:28sector as General Counsel for a company that served other companies, each having over 100
00:33employees.
00:34And before that, as you mentioned, Chair, I served as a member of Congress for eight
00:36years as the Subcommittee Chairman on the Educational Workforce, where I served under
00:40many chairmen, including the one here today.
00:42So just like that, I'm sure I'll be corrected a few times today as well.
00:47She does that a lot.
00:48Like I said, it's good to see everybody.
00:51I also had the honor of serving for eight years as Indiana's Secretary of State, where
00:55I manage the day-to-day operations of, well, near 100 employees.
00:59So I believe these experiences, in short, give me some unique insights in how our laws
01:03regulate and restrict the use of race and sex in our workplace.
01:07You know, the United States was founded on a basic idea, as self-evident today as it
01:12was 250 years ago, and that is all men are created equal.
01:17That idea is embodied in the 14th Amendment as well, which requires state governments
01:21to provide equal protection of the laws to all persons.
01:26The Fifth Amendment imposes similar constraints on the federal government.
01:29Likewise, Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, which prohibits invidious discrimination in
01:34the workplace, advances the goal of equal treatment in the private as well as public
01:39sectors.
01:40So despite the importance our nation places on equal protection under the law, corporate
01:45America and academic institutions have all too frequently embraced the notion, completely
01:50at odds with our founding principles, that to remediate racial discrimination of the
01:55past, we must somehow engage in racial discrimination now.
02:00For decades, that misguided notion was put into practice through affirmative action programs
02:05on college campuses.
02:06More recently, it has infiltrated workplaces in the form of diversity, equity, and inclusion,
02:12or DEI, initiatives that have become fashionable in the C-suites of many of America's largest
02:18companies.
02:20Such racial discrimination ignores the observation that Chief Justice Roberts made back in 2007,
02:26that the only way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating
02:34on the basis of race.
02:36In other words, eliminating racial discrimination means eliminating all of it.
02:41And that's exactly what the Supreme Court recently declared in Students for Fair Admissions.
02:47In that case, the court held that the admissions programs of Harvard College and the University
02:50of North Carolina violated the Constitution and civil rights laws because they relied
02:55on race to decide which students get admitted.
02:58The implications of the decision extend beyond the academic world, because picking winners
03:02and losers based on race is wrong and illegal in any context.
03:08It follows that DEI initiatives in corporate America that require race-based hiring practices
03:13are in most, if not all cases, likely violations of Title VII.
03:20So that's why last year I, along with 12 other State Attorneys General, sent a letter to
03:24Fortune 100 company CEOs reminding them of their obligations under the civil rights laws.
03:30In our letter, we stressed that these companies cannot discriminate based on race, including
03:34taking discriminatory actions under the guise of DEI.
03:40As Judge Robert Bork once said, to make a distinction between persons on racial grounds
03:45is utterly irrational.
03:48That is the bedrock, nonnegotiable principle that animates all of our civil rights laws,
03:53and there is no DEI exception to that in the Constitution or in Title VII.
03:59Our civil rights laws also guarantee the equal treatment of men and women, irrespective of
04:03sex.
04:04In Bostock v. Clayton County, the Supreme Court narrowly extended this principle, mistakenly
04:11in my humble view, to hold that employers violate Title VII if they fire or refuse to
04:16hire an individual because of sexual orientation or gender identity.
04:20Critically, the Court's decision only concerned the hiring and firing decisions and declined,
04:26specifically declined, to address other issues that employers may encounter.
04:32To address some of the questions left unanswered in Bostock, my office recently issued an advisory
04:37opinion concerning the use of preferred pronouns in the workplace.
04:42We determined that neither State nor Federal law requires a coworker to use the preferred
04:46pronouns and name of a fellow employee, and that an employer is likely not liable for
04:52a supposed misuse of pronouns.
04:55No Federal court has reached, and no reasonable interpretation of Title VII would support,
05:00a different conclusion.
05:03So in summary, as we continue to deal with the fallout of the Bostock decision, it is
05:07of the utmost importance that we address questions like this and give employers clarity about
05:12what the law requires.
05:13I am committed to ensuring that all workplaces in Indiana appropriately balance religious
05:18liberty, freedom of speech, safety, collegiality, and productivity.
05:23And Chairman, it's just an honor to be here and seeing my friends and colleagues again.
05:26Thank you very much.
05:27Thank you.
05:28I now recognize Mr. Berry for his opening statement.
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