Last week, the University of Florida peremptorily announced that it had ended its ill-fated experiment with DEI. “The University of Florida,” the college’s missive confirmed, has “closed the Office of the Chief Diversity Officer, eliminated DEI positions and administrative appointments, and halted DEI-focused contracts with outside vendors.” Going forward, the university explained, the more than $5 million per year that was being spent on the initiative will be redirected into “a faculty recruitment fund.” And they say that nothing ever changes!

UF’s move brought it into full compliance with a recently passed Florida statute that prohibits the state’s public colleges and universities from spending any money — including privately donated money — on diversity, equity, and inclusion programs. Still, while he was obliged to oversee the change, we doubt that following these rules was much of a hardship for the university’s new president, Ben Sasse. Last year, in his inaugural address, Sasse made it clear that universities ought not to be “in the business of advancing either a theology of the right, or a theology of the left.” “We are not,” Sasse proposed pithily, “a seminary.”