Leadership of the Trump Pentagon is more white and male than ever.

In the past three months, the administration has moved or promoted at least 11 white men to senior DOD positions—even as Esper pledged to increase diversity. W/ @sarahjcamm https://www.politico.com/news/2020/09/15/esper-pentagon-diversity-white-house-414901

Out of six undersecretaries of defense, all are white and five are male. Out of 60 presidentially appointed, Senate-confirmed positions, all but three are men. By comparison, at the end of the Obama administration in 2016, 11 were women.

At the Pentagon’s policy shop, the lack of diversity is particularly stark. Nearly all the top positions are filled by men, including all five assistant secretaries of defense, four out of five principal deputies, and 19 out of 22 deputies, and all but two are white.

There is also a transparency issue here. The Pentagon declined multiple requests to provide a breakdown of its senior civilian ranks by race. OMB stopped releasing data on the ethnic makeup of DOD’s 3M strong workforce in Sept 2019.