A DEI Scam — Squared

When you hire people to work as part of a huge scam — like corporate Diversity, Equity and Inclusion programs — turns out they act as though they’re part of a huge scam. Meet Barbara Furlow-Smiles, who led DEI efforts at Facebook from 2017 to 2021.

Oops: She promoted “inclusion” of Facebook monies into her own hands and those of her friends and family by routing cash to pals in exchange for nonexistent services, with kickbacks to her, with fake expense reports to cover. She also pushed the company to steer biz to buddies, whose fake or inflated invoices she purportedly OK’d in exchange for more kickbacks.

All in all, this felonious “champion of the marginalized” stole more than $4 million.

Meta fell hard for DEI nonsense and is now paying the price in public embarrassment. (The ultimate victim: Meta’s shareholders, among them lots of average Joes.)

Thing is, all corporate DEI efforts are a racket. Pay us, diversity consultants and VPs of inclusion argue, and stave off accusations of racism, misogyny, sexism, transphobia, fatphobia. Otherwise . . . It adds zero value to businesses and distracts from core missions (little things like providing goods and services in exchange for money).

After this summer’s landmark Supreme Court victory against racism in college admissions, corporate America’s getting justly nervous about its own sins on this front.

And backlash is growing against the idea that any company should spend a nickel on this morally backward nonsense.

The case of Barbara Furlow-Smiles just puts a face on what a con DEI’s always been.