By admin DALLAS — A federal judge reviewing Boeing’s settlement with prosecutors wants to know how the Justice Department’s diversity, equity and inclusion policies would affect the selection of an independent monitor to oversee the aerospace company during a three-year trial period.
U.S. District Judge Reed O’Connor, a conservative nominated to the federal bench in Fort Worth, Texas, by President George W. Bush in 2007, ordered the Department of Justice to clarify how it will select a monitor and whether DEI considerations will – or should – influence the choice.
The judge asked Boeing whether it would block the proposed monitor under its own DEI policy.
The establishment of an independent monitor to ensure Boeing complies with compliance and safety rules is a key element of the deal in which Boeing agreed to plead guilty to a felony charge of conspiring to defraud the U.S. government.
O’Connor has long been a favorite of conservative lawyers seeking a court that will hear their lawsuits against policies issued by Democratic presidents. In 2018, a judge issued a ruling invalidating President Barack Obama’s signature Affordable Care Act, although the U.S. Supreme Court overturned that decision. He also sought to reject expanded transgender rights.
Attacks on diversity, equity and inclusion have become a common theme among conservative Republican politicians. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis built his campaign for the GOP presidential nomination against “woke” liberal politics, although his candidacy failed. More than a dozen states, including Texas, have new laws restricting or prohibiting DEI policies at public universities.
Conservatives argue that DEI allows less-skilled people to get into college or get important jobs that affect public safety. Some conservatives on social media blamed Boeing’s DEI policies after a door plug blew off one of the planes on an Alaska Airlines flight in January.
In July, Boeing reached a settlement with the Justice Department in which the company agreed to plead guilty to conspiracy to commit fraud to mislead federal regulators into approving training requirements for pilots of the Boeing 737 Max, the latest version of the venerable Boeing 737 plane. .
As a result, airlines and pilots were unaware of a new flight control system called MCAS until it played a role in a fatal crash in Indonesia in October 2018. MCAS was again implicated in the second fatal Max crash in March 2019. Ethiopia. A total of 346 people died.
The settlement would require Boeing to pay a $243.6 million fine, spend at least $455 million on compliance and safety programs and accept oversight by an independent monitor.
Boeing and the Justice Department want O’Connor to approve the deal, which would essentially replace a 2021 settlement that allowed Boeing to avoid prosecution but did nothing to address concerns about the company’s commitment to safety and quality.
The Federal Aviation Administration has increased its oversight of Boeing after the January door plug incident, with whistleblowers alleging that the company cut corners on safety.
Relatives of passengers who died in the crashes want O’Connor to reject what they call a plea deal. They want Boeing to go to court and face a harsher penalty. They specifically oppose dissection on a monitor because they want a judge – not the government or Boeing – to choose the monitor.
Nadia Milleron of Massachusetts, whose daughter Samya Stumo died in the Ethiopian crash, said Wednesday she didn’t know what to make of the judge’s questions about the choice of monitor.
“It seems irrelevant to me,” Milleron said. “The most important thing is safety, and if a referee puts safety first, that’s great. I don’t understand his plan with DEI.”
Corporate conduct experts say the monitor could do more to improve security than under the 2021 settlement, provided the person in question is truly independent and can raise any concerns directly with the court without having to contact the Justice Department. The monitor would oversee Boeing’s compliance with security protocols and its actions to prevent future acts of fraud.
During last week’s hearing, O’Connor asked lawyers for the government and Boeing about the monitor and the impact of DEI policies on the selection. The settlement states that the Justice Department will select someone who will have “input” from Boeing.
A Justice Department lawyer said the provision did not mean a less qualified person would be selected, only that the government would consider all candidates. Boeing’s lawyers did not object to the monitor selection process described in the settlement.
In Tuesday’s order, the judge wrote that it was important to know whether DEI considerations would favor Boeing’s safety and compliance efforts. He asked the Justice Department and Boeing for a written response by Oct. 25.
“Both the Department of Justice and Boeing have publicly reaffirmed their commitment to advancing diversity, equity and inclusion (“DEI”),” including the government’s plan to leverage diversity and equity in federal hiring, O’Connor wrote.
He added that Boeing’s website “touts its commitment to ‘creating a culture of inclusion’ and the ‘set of aspirations’ it will seek to achieve by 2025 to advance equity and diversity and build a culture of inclusion,” including racial quotas and hiring more number of workers Black workers.
When considering whether to accept the settlement, O’Connor wrote that “it is important to know: how the resolution promotes safety and compliance efforts” at Boeing and whether the company will strike the claimant regarding its own DEI commitment.
It is unclear whether the judge is making a statement about DEI policy or whether he would take up the issue to reject the settlement.
“I don’t see this as a strategic move, but as a departure motivated by the court’s skepticism toward DEI,” said John Coffee, a law professor at Columbia University who studies corporate governance and white-collar crime and follows the Boeing case. “He is a conservative. Perhaps he wants to delay the decision, but that’s an unconfirmed hunch.
The Justice Department and Boeing said they would comply with the judge’s order and declined to comment further.