Vulnerable Dem Jon Tester turns on Biden admin over DEI after Montana universities stripped of federal funds

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FIRST ON FOX – Sen. Jon Tester, D-Mont., is calling on President Biden and his administration's Department of Education to promptly reverse a grant rejection for Montana universities because of a failure to meet certain diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) hiring standards. 

In a statement exclusively to Fox News Digital, the senator said, "The Biden Administration’s decision to strip critical funding from local schools is just another example of one-size-fits-all policies from Washington bureaucrats who don’t understand Montana."

"I’m calling on the Biden Administration and the Department of Education to immediately reverse this decision, because Montana’s students are more important than [made-up] D.C. hiring practices."

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Tester, right, called for Biden's education secretary, Miguel Cardona, left, to reverse the grant rejection for Montana university systems. (Reuters)

Tester, who is fighting for his political life in a competitive re-election match in a traditionally Republican state, first voiced his concerns about the grant rejection due to insufficiently diverse hiring practices in a letter to Education Secretary Miguel Cardona last month.

"I am deeply troubled by indications that the Department rejected Montana's application based primarily on an unfair scoring decision related to subjective diversity hiring requirements that failed to recognize the work already being done on this front," he wrote.

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The senator's office revealed that after 25 years of receiving the Gaining Early Awareness and Readiness for Undergraduate Programs (GEAR UP) grant, Biden's DOE rejected the Montana university systems' federal funding because Montana supposedly did not include sufficient details about its hiring practices for "a diverse group of individuals."

According to Tester, the denial was "embarrassing" for the DOE. 

The DOE told Fox News Digital it had received the letter and was in the process of reviewing it. Tester's office confirmed that it had yet to receive a response despite reaching out on Sept. 9. 

The pointed criticism of the Biden administration's implementation of DEI standards sets him apart from his party, which has been generally supportive of the initiatives. On the other hand, Republicans have criticized the continued efforts to prioritize diversity over merit in hiring. 

In less than a month, the Montana Democrat will face off in one of the most competitive races in the country against Republican candidate Tim Sheehy, a former Navy SEAL. Recently, several political handicappers have indicated Sheehy has the advantage going into the election. 

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Sheehy is favored to win by political handicappers. (Andrew Caballero-Reynolds)

A spokesperson for Sheehy's campaign criticized Tester's stance against the Biden administration on DEI, telling Fox News Digital, "Jon Tester loved the radical Left’s Woke agenda when he voted to exclude white farmers from getting assistance just because they were white, supported AOC's Green New Deal moving forward, and blamed Biden’s border crisis on Climate Change."

"After voting 95% of the time with Biden and Harris, Two-Faced Tester is doing the Tester Two-Step just ahead of an election because he’s a desperate career politician making an all-out effort to save his political career that made him rich in Washington."

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Tester has not endorsed Harris. (BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI/AFP via Getty Images)

Tester voted in line with Biden 90% of the time in the last Congress, according to FiveThirtyEight. In the first half of the 118th Congress, he voted with the president roughly 95%. 

The three-term senator has held off explicitly endorsing Vice President Harris in the presidential election, repeatedly telling reporters he is focused on Montana and his own race. 

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However, critics have pushed back at this, pointing to reports that the senator was responsible for recruiting Harris to run for Senate in 2015 when he served as chair of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee.

Tester's campaign did not provide comment to Fox News Digital in time for publication.

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