The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) hired its first chief diversity officer to direct the agency’s Office of Diversity and Inclusion.
FBI Director Christopher Wray announced that Scott McMcMillion will lead the agency’s diversity office, which was established in 2012, an FBI statement said Monday.
Scott McMillion Formally Named First FBI Chief Diversity Officer https://t.co/kDZuVu9ewY
— FBI (@FBI) April 19, 2021
“As our chief diversity officer, Scott is the right person to ensure that the FBI fosters a culture of diversity and inclusion, and that our workforce reflects all the communities we serve,” Wray said.
Before his appointment to the role, McMillion spent several years as the chair of the Black Affairs Diversity Committee at the FBI. He began working for the FBI in 1998 as a special agent and has served in numerous different roles within the agency since, according to the statement.
The FBI has made efforts to boost diversity in the last several years. The FBI has a Diversity Agent Recruitment Program that finds applicants from diverse backgrounds for special agent roles.
The agency’s efforts have been insufficient, a group of former and retired FBI special agents said in a letter sent to Wray in September 2020. The letter said that the percentage of black special agents in the FBI “steadily declined” over the course of 20 years, and that fewer black special agents were promoted to “decision-making levels.”
Some former FBI agents formed the “Mirror Project” to call on the FBI to recruit more black agents and promote them to positions of more power. (RELATED: Navy To Keep ‘Anti-Racism’ Books On Reading List Over Republican Objections)
“We’re not trying to bash the FBI,” Michael Mason, a retired FBI executive assistant director, told the CBS News in October. “We’re trying to get the FBI to raise up and become a beacon of diversity where people are held accountable to raise the number of minorities in the FBI.”