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- Cisco has not fulfilled a commitment it made last year to donate to various racial justice groups, the Washington Post first reported.
- The Cisco CEO tweeted last year the company would give $5 million to racial justice group Black Lives Matter following the George Floyd protests.
- The company distributed the $5 million to racial justice organizations adjacent to the Black Live Matter movement.
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Cisco CEO Chuck Robbins said in a 2020 tweet that he and Cisco would be donating to Black Lives Matter – a promise that has yet to be met with action a year on, according to the Washington Post.
The Silicon Valley tech company committed $5 million to several racial justice organizations, like the Equal Justice Initiative, NAACP Legal Defense Fund and Black Lives Matter. As of August 2021, it gave money to the two former groups, but not the Black Lives Matter organization, the Post reported.
"We need ACTION to eradicate racism, inequality, and injustice," Robbins said in the tweet. "This is just the beginning."
-Chuck Robbins (@ChuckRobbins) June 1, 2020
The company did not explain why it withheld funds from BLM.
"After further consideration and assessing where we'd have the biggest impact, Cisco committed funding to several social justice organizations including NAACP Legal Defense Fund and Equal Justice Initiative," Cisco's chief inclusion and collaboration officer Shari Slate said in a statement to the Washington Post.
Tech companies like Cisco have struggled with diversifying their employee base, which mostly consists of white males. Cisco also fired a handful of employees who posted offensive anti-BLM comments during virtual meetings discussing the movement, stating that the company "does not tolerate" racism.
Race and the Black Lives Matter movement were "regular agenda items almost every week" at Cisco last June, Corporate Social Responsibility Content strategist Jennifer Boynton said in a 2020 blog post shortly after Robbin's donation announcement.
Last summer, the country was rocked by protests over the murder of George Floyd by a former Minneapolis police officer. Floyd's death renewed conversations and debates on police brutality and racism, including in corporate America. Shortly after, various high-profile corporations came out denouncing systemic racism in the country, developing plans and initiatives to address problems within their company and outside in the community.
Only eight companies, including Apple, Amazon, and Google, said they made contributions to nonprofits directly associated with the Black Lives Matter movement, which picked up last summer following Floyd's murder. Over 36 corporations pledged 4 percent of their total grants to racial justice organizations and broad civil rights groups, the Washington Post analyzed.
As of publication, neither Chuck Robbins, Cisco, nor the Black Lives Matter organization have provided further comment on corporate donations to racial justice initiatives.