Stephen Miller’s America First Legal is taking aim at “woke” Kellogg’s, claiming that the food giant is “engaging in illegal, race-based discrimination” and management has attempted to “politicize and sexualize its products.”
The conservative legal group ― founded by the ex-senior adviser for former President Donald Trump ― announced that it filed a federal civil rights complaint with the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. The group called on the EEOC to investigate Kellogg Co.’s policies and programs that it described as “infused with woke ideology.”
The complaint against Kellogg’s joins a list of groups and brands that have received backlash from conservatives in recent months over efforts at inclusion and reaching out to a diverse customer base, including Bud Light, Target, the Los Angeles Dodgers and Cracker Barrel.
In a letter to the EEOC on Wednesday, America First Legal senior counselor Reed D. Rubinstein claimed that Kellogg’s “engages in unlawful employment practices by seeking to ‘balance’ its workforce based on race, color, national origin, and sex.”
The letter went on to note a number of diversity initiatives at the company, including one that strives to have 25% of “underrepresented talent” at the management level by the end of 2025.
The letter also stated concerns with a fellowship program for Black chefs at Kellogg’s and what the company has described as an “aspirational [goal] of gender 50/50 parity at the management level” by the end of 2025.
America First Legal claimed that the company’s employment practices “are unlawfully based on ‘equity’” which it described as “a euphemism for illegal discrimination.”
The company disputed the claims. Kellogg’s told Reuters in a statement that it was committed to complying with employment laws and has policies to prohibit workplace discrimination.
“At Kellogg, our aspiration is to better reflect the diversity of our consumers and to strengthen our inclusive culture,” the statement read.
America First Legal, in another letter sent to Kellogg’s CEO Steve Cahillane, claimed company management “has hijacked the brand to advance an extreme political and social agenda.”
“Despite the immense trust that hard-working American mothers and fathers have placed in Kellogg’s, management has discarded the Company’s long-held family-friendly marketing approach to politicize and sexualize its products,” the letter read.
America First Legal went on to refer to several products and partnerships including a “Together with Pride” cereal featuring the Frosted Mini Wheats mascot holding a pride flag, Cheez-It boxes with RuPaul and Snooki, NEON Pink Block Party Lemonade Pop-Tarts, an “All Together” cereal-flavored lip balm and Tony the Tiger’s red carpet appearance with Dylan Mulvaney in June.
“Kellogg’s is yet another big corporation that will break the law and hurt its shareholders’ interests to serve the twisted woke ideology of its officers and directors; like Disney, Budweiser, and Target, Kellogg’s management has shown nothing but contempt and disdain for American families and American workers,” the legal group wrote on X, Twitter’s rebrand.
The legal group’s letters to the cereal giant arrive just days after it sued Target on behalf of an investor who claimed the company “misrepresented the adequacy of its risk monitoring” when it faced backlash over LGBTQ-themed products, Reuters reported.