KPMG has become the latest Big Four firm to roll back its DEI commitments. According to the Financial Times, CEO Paul Knopp sent an email to KPMG employees saying it would end DEI initiatives like its Accelerate 2025 program, a program,the FT wrote, that “aimed to have half of its partners and managing directors from under-represented groups by this year.”
“The legal landscape surrounding diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts has been shifting, via executive orders and in the courts,” Knopp wrote in the email. KPMG is a federal contractor that received $503 million in fees in fiscal year 2024, per Bloomberg Law.
The status of the Trump administration’s DEI-related executive orders is in limbo. A federal court temporarily blocked some provisions of the orders from being enacted, including requirements that “contractors and grant recipients to certify that they do not engage in any “equity-related” programs.”
Data deleted: Three of the Big Four accounting firms have removed DEI data from its websites or otherwise hidden it. KPMG scrubbed years’ worth of transparency reports about its DEI initiatives from its website, and its DEI page has been replaced by one on careers and culture. Deloitte and PwC both removed links to transparency reports, but the reports themselves are still available, the Financial Times said. KPMG UK still has its transparency reports up.
What’s more, Deloitte and KPMG have both said they will no longer track DEI metrics.
EY, which received $638 million in federal contracts last year, hasn’t yet made any announcements regarding its DEI programs.
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