She advanced DEI at her university. Her son-in-law, Vice President JD Vance, wants to end it nationwide.
As universities around the country race to assess new federal policies geared toward ending programs related to diversity, equity and inclusion, known as DEI, one college administrator is in a potentially tricky position.
Lakshmi Chilukuri is the provost of the University of California San Diego's Sixth College. She is also Vice President JD Vance's mother-in-law. Chilukuri helped create a pilot course on race, ethnicity and gender in biology and medicine, served on the university's biological sciences diversity committee, and has written proudly of her school's commitment to diversity.
The university features its diversity efforts prominently on its website and a letter from Chilukuri to incoming students emphasizes the school's "steadfast adherence to principles that drive equity, inclusion, and an embrace of diversity."
"As we come into the new academic year with the pandemic not quite yet in the rearview mirror, with issues of equity and systemic racism, anti-Blackness and anti-Asian racism yet unresolved, we have before us both opportunity and responsibility," Chilukuri wrote in the undated letter. The Internet Archive shows the letter was first posted in late 2021, with minor edits made over the next year. It has since remained as the main body of text on the Sixth College's "About" page.
A crackdown on what President Trump and Vance call "wokeness" has been a hallmark of their administration's first weeks. Widespread scalebacks of DEI programs in academia, government and across corporations have marked some of the administration's earliest marquee victories.
Vance said in a statement, "I don't like DEI, and I'm proud of what our administration has done on that front."
"But I love my mother-in-law. If she doesn't share my views on DEI I suppose I'll have to do what 99 percent of Americans do when confronted with a family member who doesn't always agree with them: get over it," Vance said. "I'll choose instead to focus on her kindness and the fact that she's an incredible mother and loving grandmother to the most important people in my life."
Vance added, "This story exists because CBS has decided that harassing my mother in law is a reasonable price in order to attack President Trump." Chilukuri did not reply to emailed questions. A spokesperson for the university declined to comment.
The Trump administration has attacked DEI on college campuses with particular zeal, threatening investigations, lawsuits and canceled federal funding. A Feb. 14 "Dear Colleague" letter from the Department of Education to schools across the country warned that they risked federal funding if they continued to take race into account when making scholarship or hiring decisions, or include race as a policy factor in any "other aspects of student, academic and campus life."
The administration's anti-DEI campaign led a U.S. attorney to warn the Georgetown Law School that its students wouldn't be considered for jobs at his office unless the school renounced its DEI programs. Mr. Trump's alma mater, the University of Pennsylvania, has removed from its websites most references to diversity and inclusion, and on March 7, the University of Virginia's governing board voted to dissolve its office of diversity, equity and inclusion.
Many corporations have followed suit, including CBS News' parent company Paramount, which in late February ceased using hiring goals related to race, ethnicity, sex or gender, among other policy changes related to DEI.
Vance has been vocal about combatting DEI, speaking about it frequently since his earliest days in politics. In a 2021 speech, Vance, quoting Richard Nixon, said professors are "the enemy," and called on Americans to "aggressively attack the universities in this country," saying "they care more about diversity, equity and inclusion than they do their own society." That view is shared by the president, and the White House has backed it up, issuing executive orders that threaten to withhold federal funding from institutions operating what it calls "illegal" DEI programs. It has not clarified exactly what that means.
The president also ordered federal agencies to identify colleges with endowments over $1 billion that might be susceptible to investigation or lawsuits due to their DEI policies. UCSD's endowment is more than $1.4 billion, according to the UC San Diego Foundation's website. Last fiscal year, UCSD received more than $500 million in federal funds for research.
Vance married Chilukuri's daughter Usha in 2014, and the couple have three young children. Vance said in a 2020 podcast interview that Chilukuri took a yearlong sabbatical from her work as a professor to help care for one of her grandchildren. He described Chilukuri and her husband — also a professor — as classic, doting grandparents.
"You can sort of see the effect it has on him to be around them, like they spoil him and sort of all the classic stuff that grandparents do to grandchildren," Vance said. "But it makes him a much better human being to have exposure to his grandparents, and the evidence on this, by the way, is like super clear."
Chilukuri has worked at UCSD for decades, rising through the ranks to become provost in 2018.
"Professor Chilukuri has a demonstrated record of commitment to undergraduate education, equity, and diversity," wrote the university's chancellor and executive vice chancellor in an announcement of her promotion to provost. They called Chilukuri "a creative and dynamic educator."
The popular professor, who also goes by "Provost Chill" and "Dr. C," championed DEI initiatives at the school. A 2019 article on the UCSD website examined BILD 60, a class that the school's 2024-2025 catalog lists as satisfying students' DEI course requirement.
The course, called "Exploring Issues of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in Relation to Human Biology," was developed because members of the school's Division of Biological Sciences' Diversity Committee, including Chilukuri, "recognized the need for a course that looked at DEI issues through a scientific lens," according to the article.
Her commitment to inclusiveness was apparent long before she was a provost. Former student Kjeld Aamodt recalled fondly taking a freshman year lecture taught by Chilukuri nearly two decades ago.
"It was a huge class. It was probably 500 people in that class, but I remember feeling like she recognized me and made me feel special, and had a genuine interest in me," Aamodt said in an interview with CBS News.
Aamodt, now an orthodontist, said Chilukuri was one of just a few professors to leave a lasting impact on him — repeating, "verbatim" he said, some of her teachings to his own children.
"I remember her being fairly consistent about [diversity and inclusion], even then we were a very diverse student population, a lot of different ethnicities, and all under one roof and one big auditorium, you know, 500 strong," Aamodt said. "And I remember feeling welcomed and observing her being able to connect with people from very different backgrounds, and I got that feeling that she was practicing what she preached."
That commitment to diversity is clear in Chilukuri's letter to incoming students. She wrote of the "opportunity and responsibility" to address systemic racism:
"How we embrace both will greatly influence who we are as a college and a community. Whether through our African Black Diaspora Living Learning Community, our Multi-Cultural Living Learning Community, programming through our Student Affairs, Residence Life, Academic Advising, Student Council, Student Organizations, or our Culture Art and Technology core academic program, I invite each of you to be part of the conversation and part of the solution."
