Conservative activist Kenny Xu, who’s fighting what he says are harmful diversity, equity and inclusion practices at US medical schools, says he’s notched another anti-DEI win at the University of North Carolina — with the help of a renowned, African-born, US-based heart surgeon.
Xu persuaded Harvard-trained Dr. Nche Zama, 66, who was born in the Republic of Cameroon and immigrated alone to the US at age 14 with just $20, to speak at one of the anti-DEI events Xu organized in Chapel Hill in February aimed at getting the UNC medical school to back off its policies.
Now UNC’s medical school says it has disbanded its DEI task force, adding that it has no plans to implement its recommendations now or in the future.
“The most important issue should be educational excellence but it’s the one thing missing in all these DEI policies,” Zama, 66, a Pennsylvania-based cardiovascular and thoracic surgeon who was raised in a grass hut in Cameroon, told The Post about why he spoke on behalf of Xu’s campaign.
“I’m all for diversity and inclusion but I believe these issues should be grounded in excellence in education.”
Zama and Xu, the founder of Color Us United, had objected to recommendations made by a DEI task force set up by the school.
They had been supported by FIRE (The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression), which wrote to the UNC Medical School to say the organization was concerned about possible First Amendment violations incurred by the school’s DEI policies.
But the school revealed it was backing off of many of its 84 DEI task force recommendations in response to the letter from FIRE.
“The recommendations have not been operationalized and the task force has concluded its work,” the school said in its response to FIRE, sent in May.
The letter also said there is no plan to implement the task force’s recommendations now or in the future.
The school emailed The Post a statement that the task force, which was formed in 2019, had actually completed its work in 2020.
Xu, however, disputed the claim and said the school has been carrying out taskforce-recommended policies such as “unconscious bias training” and “racially-preferential admissions” since at least 2020.
Xu, the son of highly-educated Chinese immigrants, has been on a mission with his group, Color Us United, to end what he sees as dangerous DEI policies in medical schools and bring back academic meritocracy.
In February, after Xu’s lobbying efforts, the board of governors at the University of North Carolina voted to ban diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) statements from hiring and tenure decisions.
Xu told The Post Thursday that what he called the medical school’s recent “public reversal” of its plan to implement the task force’s plans was the first of its kind among American universities which have been ramping up DEI policies since the May 2020 death of George Floyd.
“We needed a win at UNC medical school to go to Harvard and Stanford medical schools and say what you guys are doing is not scientifically necessary,” Xu said. “It doesn’t help the quality of patient care.”
Zama, the author of “Mommy Please Don’t Die,” which details how he watched his mother bleed out in childbirth and die when he was only 10 and then how he later came to the US with almost no money and became a surgeon, said that racism is a reality but lowering standards in medical school for minority students is a bad idea.
“It’s not fair to black or Hispanic or Native American students,” Zama said of DEI policies in medical schools.
“If you’re promoting numerical equity based on having a certain number of minorities or disadvantaged people and you’re allowing them into medical school based on that, they’re not going to be prepared for what is a very competitive environment.
“Health care is the most important thing on this planet and to lower the standards to satisfy a policy is unfair to the patient and to the doctor who may not have the level of confidence and ability he or she should have because of these policies. DEI has drowned out what real diversity should look like.”
Xu and his three-person organization began their campaign at UNC by lobbying the medical school trustees, many of whom, he said, were clueless about what DEI really meant and how embedded it had become at the university and the medical school.
Before Xu came on the scene, the UNC medical school’s Guidelines for Appointment, Promotion and Tenure stated that all applicants seeking to work at the school had to furnish statements involving their “depth and breadth of efforts in each (DEI) area, including but not limited to impact of work, philosophy and style, team-based projects, and mentee interactions.”
After Xu’s initial campaign, the school’s board of governors voted to ban DEI statements from hiring and tenure decisions.
