This bill repeals and amends scores of provisions added to the CHIPS Act of 2022 and the Research and Development, Competition, and Innovation Act that create diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs, data collection, offices, or grant conditions. It deletes targeted programs (for example, a statutory NSF Chief Diversity Officer post and several DEI grant authorities), removes race- or MSI-based language in parts of the law, and narrows outreach and scholarship provisions to remove explicit DEI priorities.
The measure also creates a new, broad limit on agency practices: agency heads may not impose ‘‘nonstatutory mandates’’ on prospective federal fund recipients that require DEI-style workforce plans, childcare or wraparound services, community investment plans, environmental or climate mitigation planning, project labor agreements, or consultation with local labor organizations. For fund-seekers and grant managers, the bill replaces statutory pro-DEI tools with a statutory prohibition on a long list of administrative conditions — a structural shift in how federal research and semiconductor funding can be conditioned.
At a Glance
What It Does
Title I repeals or amends many DEI-focused statutory provisions in the CHIPS Act and the Research & Development, Competition, and Innovation Act (e.g., repeals DEI grant programs, removes the NSF Chief Diversity Officer position, and strips certain data-collection and reporting mandates). Title II bars agency heads from imposing specified nonstatutory mandates on entities seeking federal funds.
Who It Affects
Federal research agencies (NSF, DOE, NIST), institutions that receive CHIPS and related R&D funds (universities, research consortia, semiconductor firms), federally funded workforce and outreach programs, and applicants for federal scholarships and fellowships that currently include DEI elements.
Why It Matters
The bill rewrites statutory authorities used to direct outreach, data collection, and diversity-focused programming and creates a new administrative restriction that prevents agencies from attaching many common workforce, community, or environmental conditions to funding — changing both the content of programs and how agencies may administratively manage grants and contracts.
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What This Bill Actually Does
The bill operates in two parts. Title I targets specific statutory provisions added since the CHIPS and Science legislation by excising or revising named sections across multiple statutes: it repeals discrete grant programs, removes statutory DEI positions and programmatic authorities, eliminates certain data-collection and reporting duties, and edits language that formerly grouped historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUs), Tribal Colleges or Universities (TCUs), and minority-serving institutions (MSIs) to focus explicitly on HBCUs and TCUs.
Where the prior law established DEI-driven outreach, recruitment, or programmatic requirements, the bill either deletes those paragraphs or replaces them with neutral outreach language focused on geographic and capacity objectives.
Mechanically, Title I accomplishes its goals by line edits: striking whole sections (for example, named sections in the Research and Development, Competition, and Innovation Act and in DOE statutes), amending cross-references and tables of contents, and redesignating provisions where necessary. That means statutory authorities that created positions, required reports, or authorized DEI-targeted awards would vanish from the United States Code; programs that depend on those statutory hooks would lose the specific legal language that funded or directed them.Title II defines ‘‘nonstatutory mandates’’ as agency-imposed requirements that are not explicitly found in statute, then forbids agency heads from imposing a catalog of such mandates on entities seeking agency funding.
The prohibited list includes workforce DEI-style hiring plans, childcare and other wraparound workforce services, community investment plans, environmental or climate mitigation planning tied to funding, project labor agreements, and mandated consultation with local labor organizations. The provision is structured as a blanket administrative prohibition rather than an authorization of new enforcement tools, so its practical force will depend on how agencies interpret what counts as a ‘‘nonstatutory mandate’’ and whether courts defer to agency determinations.Together the titles remove statutory tools used to promote diversity and place a statutory check on administrative conditions agencies often attach to grants and cooperative agreements.
The result is both narrower statutory authority for DEI programs and a new administrative constraint that limits agencies’ ability to craft funding conditions beyond what Congress has written into law.
The Five Things You Need to Know
The bill repeals multiple named sections of the Research and Development, Competition, and Innovation Act and related DOE statutes, removing statutory DEI programs, data-collection duties, and reporting authorities.
It eliminates the statutory position creating an NSF Chief Diversity Officer and repeals a statutory program that awarded research funds explicitly to support DEI in STEM.
It changes subtitle language that previously grouped MSIs with HBCUs and TCUs, replacing MSI references and preserving HBCU/TCU programmatic achievements while removing race-based activities.
Title II defines ‘‘nonstatutory mandate’’ and prohibits agency heads from imposing any such mandates as a condition on entities seeking federal funding, listing nine categories (e.g.
workforce DEI plans, childcare, community investment, climate mitigation).
The bill accomplishes its deletions through direct repeals, section strikes, and table-of-contents edits rather than by creating replacement authorities or new funding streams.
Section-by-Section Breakdown
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Strike CHIPS inclusion/ opportunity provisions
This section deletes a short, named portion of the CHIPS Act that the bill drafters identify as relating to ‘‘opportunity and inclusion’’ and then renumbers adjacent sections. Practically, that change removes a statutory reference point programs and agencies had been using to justify outreach or inclusion activities tied to CHIPS funding; grants or programs that relied on that statutory citation will no longer have it in title 15’s CHIPS-related notes.
Repeal redundant DOE and R&D collaboration programs
Section 102 repeals an explicit DOE Research and Innovation Act section and a named section of the R&D/Competition/Innovation Act, and also removes several DOE education/ enhancement sections from earlier law. The repeals remove statutory authorizations for specific collaboration and education activities at DOE; agencies lose the named legal authorities that supported particular partnership or education initiatives and administrative programs tied to those sections.
Sweeping deletion of DEI-focused grants, data, and positions
These consecutive provisions strike or amend numerous statutory paragraphs: outreach requirements for underrepresented communities, diversity considerations in research-capacity programs, an explicit NSF scholarship/fellowship DEI implementation framework, statutory DEI prize competitions, data-collection mandates on faculty demographics, best-practice DEI guidance, and specific reporting requirements. The mechanics vary between full repeals and targeted edits (striking paragraphs, redesignating subparagraphs). For program managers, the key consequence is loss of statutory text authorizing or directing these DEI activities; for currently active grants, the underlying appropriation and grant terms will control continuation, not the repealed statutory language itself.
Preserve HBCU/TCU achievements; revise Office of STEM Engagement purpose
The bill narrows language that previously grouped MSIs with HBCUs and TCUs by explicitly preserving HBCU and TCU references while removing MSI and race-based program elements. It also amends the Office of STEM Engagement’s statutory purpose to remove an explicit DEI objective and replace ‘‘diverse’’ with ‘‘robust and capable.’
New prohibition on agency nonstatutory funding conditions
Title II gives statutory definition to ‘‘nonstatutory mandate’’ (an agency-imposed, non-statutory requirement) and then prohibits agency heads from imposing a specified list of such mandates on entities seeking federal funds. The list is detailed — it covers DEI-style workforce plans, childcare and wraparound services, community investment, environmental and climate planning, project labor agreements, and consultation with local labor groups. The provision is framed as an absolute bar; it does not create an enforcement mechanism within the bill, so challenges or compliance disputes would likely arise in agency rulemaking, grant guidance, or litigation over whether a condition is ‘‘statutory’’ or otherwise allowed.
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Every bill creates winners and losers. Here's who stands to gain and who bears the cost.
Who Benefits
- Commercial semiconductor firms and private research contractors — they lose numerous administratively imposed DEI and community-commitment conditions, which reduces compliance obligations attached to federal grants or cooperative agreements and shortens procurement/award lead times.
- Applicants for federal research awards (universities and companies that opposed DEI conditions) — fewer statutory grant conditions and the Title II ban lower administrative compliance costs and reduce the risk that agency guidance will add new nonstatutory obligations.
- Certain federal grant applicants that prioritize geographic or capacity-based outreach — the bill replaces some race- or status-based outreach language with neutral outreach and capacity language, aligning program focus toward workforce capacity and geography.
Who Bears the Cost
- Underrepresented students and communities served by DEI-targeted programs — repeals remove statutory authorities that funded outreach, scholarships, and capacity-building specifically tailored to those groups, risking reduced program funding or elimination.
- Federal research agencies (NSF, DOE, NIST) — statutory tools used to direct program priorities, require reporting, or create staff positions (e.g., NSF Chief Diversity Officer) are removed, forcing agencies to redesign program rules or rely solely on appropriations language and internal policy.
- Colleges and universities that relied on data-collection or grant conditions to support institutional change — those institutions may lose targeted supports and the statutory basis for institutional programs; they may also face uncertainty where contracts or grant terms were premised on now-repealed statutory language.
Key Issues
The Core Tension
The bill tries to reconcile two legitimate aims — speeding and depoliticizing federal investment in semiconductors and STEM by removing administrative DEI conditions, and preserving legally neutral, efficient grantmaking — but those aims clash with the policy goal of using targeted statutory authorities to remedy historical underrepresentation. Eliminating statutory DEI tools reduces bureaucratic friction but also removes proven levers for directing resources to underserved populations; the central dilemma is whether administrative neutrality and fewer conditions are a preferable trade for losing the targeted mechanisms that actively build a more diverse STEM pipeline.
The bill creates several implementation and legal ambiguities. First, repealing statutory authorizations removes explicit legislative authority for programs, but it does not automatically cancel appropriations or active grant obligations created under prior law or contracts.
Agencies will need to decide whether to continue programs under residual authority, rewrite solicitations, or wind down awards — a process that could create gaps in funding and administrative confusion. Second, Title II’s prohibition rests on the distinction between ‘‘statutory’’ and ‘‘nonstatutory’’ mandates; that line is not always clear.
Agencies regularly impose programmatic conditions through notice-and-comment rulemaking, agency regulations, or award-specific terms. Litigation over whether a given workforce or environmental condition is a forbidden nonstatutory mandate is likely, and courts will need to decide how much deference to give to agencies’ characterizations of conditions as statutory or administrative.
Third, several of the bill’s deletions are surgical (strike this subsection, redesignate that paragraph) and will ripple through cross-references and program guidance. Compliance officers and grant managers must map statutory deletions to existing regulations, cooperative agreement terms, and Memoranda of Understanding to identify residual obligations.
Finally, removing DEI-related data collection and reporting raises evaluation questions: without mandated demographic data or DEI reporting, Congress, agencies, and universities lose a precisely targeted tool for measuring workforce composition and program performance, which could make it harder to detect and address gaps even where non-statutory, voluntary programs exist.
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