Accenture said it ditched DEI. The DOJ just caught them running secret race scorecards

Doug Napier

October 9, 2026

Color-coded monthly dashboards. Separate promotion conversations for candidates who moved demographic numbers in the “right” direction. Leadership programs with the door closed to the “wrong” race or sex. These are just a few of the flashing indicators that companies who should have known better had nonetheless embraced illegal employment practices. The avoidable result was the payment of huge fines. IBM paid $17 million. Deloitte paid $21.5 million. Now Accenture agreed to pay $25 million to resolve Justice Department allegations that it did the same things, while certifying it did not in order to continue its collection of big bucks from taxpayers.

Three of the largest consulting firms — companies selling “expert” advice to government and Fortune 500 clients on workplace “transformation” — have written checks totaling $63.5 million in a single year under the Civil Rights Fraud Initiative.

That’s a pattern. And a problem.

The DOJ alleged that since 2017, Accenture Federal Services treated race and sex as factors in hiring and promotions to hit “stealth” workforce composition goals. Business-unit leaders received monthly summaries of the exact percentage of each race and sex in their units, highlighted to show if they were on target. Those scorecards drove improper hiring decisions, according to the DOJ charges.

The full article can be found in Washington Examiner.

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