It was normal to fill out the EEO-1 report in the United States for almost 60 years. Companies with 100 or more workers sent the federal government annual demographic breakdowns of their workers’ gender, race, ethnicity, and job category without much trouble. The form was always there in the background, not very exciting but useful for keeping track of who was working where. At the highest levels, that consistency is now being called into question.
The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission sent a proposal to the White House on May 14, 2026, asking them to get rid of not only EEO-1 but also all of the workforce demographic reporting requirements, from EEO-1 to EEO-5, as well as any duties that came from Title VII, the ADA, or other federal employment laws. It might be the end of decades of standard federal data collection on the workforce if it passes regulatory review and public comment.
The plan isn’t set in stone yet. The Office of Management and Budget has up to 90 days to look it over. There will be public comment periods and possible changes before it becomes a final rule. But it’s so clear where things are going that HR lawyers are already telling clients not to take apart their reporting infrastructure just yet. That advice sounds less like legal caution and more like someone watching a storm form on the horizon. “If you have a structure in place for putting this data together, don’t dismantle it just yet,” Kara Govro of Mineral Mitratech is said to have told employers.
This time is interesting and a little confusing because of the difference between Washington’s retreat and what’s going on at the state level. On June 4, 2026, Colorado passed HB 26-1207, which made a state-level EEO-1 equivalent that will stay in place even if the federal program ends. The law sends demographic information about the workforce through the state’s business filing system and makes a lot of it public. This is more open than the federal program ever required. California and Massachusetts go even further and require pay data to be sent in along with demographic data. These states are not going to wait.
Something tells me that the patchwork system that’s coming together at the state level will be harder to run than the single federal system that it might eventually replace. Employers who do business in more than one state might have to send different demographic reports to different agencies at different times, with different rules about what to include and how to disclose it. It wouldn’t get easier to follow the rules; it would just get harder to plan for and understand. That’s not just a hypothetical worry. Things are already going in that direction.
When the proposal came up, twelve former federal officials from the EEOC and the Department of Labor officially opposed it. They said that law enforcement would not be able to see systemic discrimination patterns that only become clear when they happen on a large scale if they lost access to centralized workforce data. Jenny R. Yang, who used to be chair of the EEOC, made it clear: enforcement agencies can’t put resources where discrimination is happening if they don’t have accurate data on the workforce. That’s a good point, but it probably won’t stop the current administration from wanting to roll back frameworks that are similar to DEI.
The funny thing is that many big businesses probably won’t stop collecting this information even if the government stops requiring them to. Workforce analytics are now used in pay equity audits, ESG disclosures, getting ready for internal lawsuits, and reporting to the board. Giving up demographic visibility isn’t really an option for businesses that need to meet the needs of investors or trial lawyers. Who they have to answer to and what rules they have to follow change.
Still, it’s not clear if the EEOC’s proposal will stay the same, be changed a lot, or get stuck in legal battles for years. It’s becoming more and more clear that the EEO-1 rebellion, in which states fill the void that Washington might leave, is already happening. The map of how Americans report their jobs is changing, and it might not be going in a simpler direction.
