ATLANTA, Ga. (Atlanta News First) - Despite not getting a vote on the state House or Senate floor before the crucial halfway point of the legislative session, a bill banning diversity, equity and inclusion programs in public schools still has life.

If legislation doesn’t pass one chamber or the other before Crossover Day, it can still be revived if lawmakers attach it to a bill that did pass the House or Senate. That’s what happened when a group of legislators gutted House Bill 127 — a proposal intended to let public school teachers roll over five paid-time off days instead of the three they currently can — and instead, replaced it entirely with language on the DEI ban.

Under Senate Bill 120, the language of which was essentially copied and pasted into HB 127, K-12 schools and colleges and universities that receive state dollars would lose that funding if they fail to abolish programs that “promote, support or maintain any programs or activities that advocate for diversity, equity and inclusion.”

“The DEI initiative actually ostracizes some people because they don’t believe in the philosophies that are there,” said state Sen. Marty Harbin (R-Tyrone), the sponsor of SB 120. “Defunding these programs does not mean that we do not support diversity. It means we support true diversity of thought where students and faculty are engaged in open dialect without fear of reprisal.”

But facultySome wondered if English-as-a-second-language programs or programs that help disabled students fell under the umbrella of DEI.

“Teachers are going to overcorrect. Schools are going to overcorrect,” said Mikayla Arciaga, an education advocate with the Intercultural Development Research Association. “Everything that we do right now that is about making kids feel welcome in our schools, which, inclusion is part of DEI, could be a threat to a school’s funding and schools are already trying to make ends meet.”

The Georgia effort to ban those programs almost directly mirrors an attempt by President Donald Trump to ban DEI at the federal level by withholding federal funding to public entities that receive it.

Time is running out for a vote on the ban. This year’s legislative session ends Friday.

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