Rejecting Santa Ono At U-Florida Shows We’re Done With DEI

In a decision that reverberated throughout academia, on June 3 the Florida Board of Governors rejected Santa Ono’s candidacy for 14th president of the University of Florida. For many, this marked the latest and most potent example of a cultural counterrevolution — a quiet but forceful rejection of the ideological monoculture that has long dominated American universities.

Ono, an experienced administer with a background leading discriminatory diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) initiatives as the former president of the University of Michigan, was the University of Florida Board of Trustees’ chosen candidate. Yet, in a rare and revealing move, the overseeing Florida Board of Governors overrode that recommendation for the first time in the 17-member board’s history with a 10-6 vote.

Hours of questioning showed rejecting Ono was not due to his academic credentials or professional competence. It was about a deeper question: What kind of culture do we want our institutions to represent?

The timing is no coincidence. Since President Donald Trump’s return to power in 2025, red states have taken an emboldened stance on the front lines of culture wars. The rejection of Ono was not a surprise or result of personal animus — it’s a bellwether in a broader campaign to dismantle the leftist orthodoxy deeply embedded in higher education.

As Trump moves to defund Ivy League leviathans such as Harvard, an institution so rich it could let students in for free, the University of Florida’s latest decision signifies he and his allies are fighting a winning battle. Under Gov. Ron DeSantis, Florida has been the pinnacle of the push against discriminatory DEI policies.

DeSantis’s administration has systematically curtailed DEI programs across state universities. Five of Florida’s 12 public universities have since hired new presidents, including UF’s hiring of former Sen. Ben Sasse, who stepped down in July 2024 due to his wife’s health. Sasse’s departure spawned a fresh search that put the longevity of the GOP’s merit-based approach to the test. These policies are holding strong.

Ono represented everything the MAGA movement’s vision opposes. Although he reportedly agreed to the new Florida law banning taxpayer dollars from funding DEI efforts in public colleges, many questioned whether that commitment was a matter of principle or lip service to get across the finish line. His past public statements, long record of support for DEI policies, and handling of left-wing campus protests left conservative leaders skeptical.

Ono attempted to distance himself from the radical ideology he championed in his three previous university president positions, penning an op-ed on May 8 in which he admitted he “saw how DEI became something else — more about ideology, division and bureaucracy, not student success.” It was too little, too late. It was only during his final months as president of the University of Michigan, just after President Trump came in swinging with executive orders, that Ono moved to reassign the college’s DEI staff and crack down on pro-Palestine protests after allowing them to run rampant.

Americans have learned that merely hiring an “administrator” is not enough. In recent years, many such figures have used the cover of technocratic neutrality to smuggle in political agendas. DEI, once marketed as a benign human resources policy, has became a vehicle for leftist institutional capture — a way to reshape curricula, silence dissenting voices, and impose progressive opinions and unquestionable truth.

The second Trump administration has amplified the urgency of challenging this apparatus. Republicans at the state level have stopped playing defense. Instead of tweaking policies around rough edges, they are pulling out the root of the problem.

Ono got the cold shoulder from the Sunshine State because he symbolized a model of leadership that prioritizes social engineering over scholarship, activism over academics, and virtue signaling over merit-based success. In a hard-won decision, Florida said no to this yet again.

The culture war goes beyond transgender bathrooms and withdrawing state subsidies for child pornography. It’s about who shapes the minds of the next generation and whose values they carry into the world. Ono’s rejection may not dominate cable news for more than a day, but make no mistake — it marks the end of the old consensus and the start of something new.

Ono didn’t pass the test, but the conservative movement just earned an A-plus in cultural leadership. Now, the University of Florida must move forward by repeating the search for the next 14th president from scratch. The semester is just beginning, and America is ready to graduate from the age of Democrat domination.

Julianna Frieman is a writer based in North Carolina. She got her bachelor’s degree in Political Science from the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. She is pursuing her master’s degree in Communications (Digital Strategy) at the University of Florida. Her work has been published by the Daily Caller, The American Spectator, and The Federalist. Follow her on X at @juliannafrieman.