Two top officials overseeing diversity initiatives at Johns Hopkins University left their posts earlier this summer amid a nationwide rollback to such efforts pushed by the Trump administration.

Katrina Caldwell, the vice provost for diversity and inclusion and chief diversity officer, as well as Emil Cunningham, her deputy, both left in June, the university confirmed to The Baltimore Banner in a statement Friday. In the interim, Alisha Knight is serving as the university’s acting chief diversity officer.

Caldwell had served as chief diversity officer at Hopkins since July 2020. Her responsibilities, according to her LinkedIn page, included shaping universitywide curriculum, infrastructure, policies and programs.

Cunningham worked at Hopkins for more than three years, according to LinkedIn, during which he was responsible for growing diversity efforts across the university.

Knight, the acting chief diversity officer, previously served as the executive director for faculty diversity at the university.

Neither Caldwell nor Cunningham responded immediately Friday to requests for comment.

Public messaging from the university’s Office of Diversity and Inclusion has been sporadic in recent months. The last time the office posted on LinkedIn was seven months ago, and the last Instagram post from the office’s official account was shared in February.

This is not the first time Hopkins has lost a high ranking officer whose role at the Baltimore university focuses on efforts to improve diversity, equity and inclusion for students, faculty and staff.

In 2024, the university’s medical school was embroiled in controversy after its chief diversity, equity and inclusion officer faced a firestorm of online attacks.

Sherita Golden, the diversity officer at the time, explored the idea of who has privilege in society and named white people, heterosexuals and middle-aged people as among those who benefit from it. That caught the attention of prominent right-wing influencers, as well as Donald Trump Jr. and Elon Musk, who criticized her viewpoint.

Golden stepped down from her role soon after, and the university pledged to conduct a “thorough national search” to find her replacement. But the university said in June that role has not been filled and the search for a replacement has been “paused.”

Harvard University and Columbia University, which have both been singled out by the Trump administration for criticism of their past efforts at diversity, have edited or erased their statements, programs and offices on the issue. The University of Michigan shuttered its flagship diversity program earlier this year.

Last month, a legal group founded by a member of the Trump administration filed a complaint with the U.S. Department of Justice alleging Hopkins’ medical school engaged in racial discrimination against white students.

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