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Target was one of corporate America’s most forceful supporters of diversity and inclusion initiatives and vowed to support Black Americans in the aftermath of George Floyd’s murder by police in Target’s home city of Minneapolis in 2020. But less than five years later, Target has dialed back its high-profile DEI program.

In 2020, Target CEO Brian Cornell said Floyd’s murder, which took place just 10 minutes from Target’s headquarters, had a personal impact on him and Target employees, and Cornell vowed to reopen one of Target’s stores damaged in protests against police violence.

George Floyd “could have been one of my Target team members,” Cornell later said.

Months after the murder, Target pledged to increase its Black workforce by 20% throughout the company over three years and take other steps to “advance racial equity,” including establishing an executive Racial Equity Action and Change committee to “focus specifically on how we can drive lasting impact” for Black employees and customers.

The following year, Target pledged to spend more than $2 billion with Black-owned businesses by the end of 2025, including adding more products from 500 Black-owned vendors to stores, and pledging $100 million to support Black-led nonprofits and provide scholarships to students attending HBCUs.

Target was honored for its “outstanding commitment to achieving Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI)” in 2022 by the Executive Leadership Council, a prominent organization of global Black CEOs. Cornell accepted the award for Target at a star-studded gala.

Cornell defended Target’s “bold commitments” to DEI in 2023, saying they were helping Target’s business.

“That focus on diversity and inclusion and equity has fueled much of our growth,” he said. “The things we’ve done from a DE&I standpoint — it’s adding value, it’s helping us drive sales, it’s building greater engagement with both our teams and our guests. And those are just the right things for our business today.”