The U.S. House of Representatives is set to see its Black Republican caucus vanish entirely after this year. The four Black Republicans currently serving in the U.S. House of Representatives are: Byron Donalds (FL), John James (MI), Wesley Hunt (TX), and Burgess Owens (UT).

In previous years, the party made a concerted effort to cultivate a more diverse congressional presence, but now all four remaining Black Republicans currently serving in the chamber will leave Congress at the end of their terms, The New York Times reports.

Around 2018, former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy led a strategic push to recruit Black candidates, arguing that the G.O.P. needed to broaden its appeal to ensure long-term political viability. By 2022, that strategy had achieved measurable growth, helping to elect a small cohort of Black lawmakers to the House.

“I’d just become leader, and I’m excited, and President Trump’s there, and I look over at the Democrats, and they stand up — they look like America,” McCarthy said at a Times book event in 2023. “We stand up. We look like the most restrictive country club in America.”

The current exodus, however, suggests any gains were fleeting: Of the four departing members, Donalds, James, and Hunt are stepping down to pursue statewide offices, while Burgess is retiring due to redistricting changes that effectively eliminated his seat. 

The shift comes during a broader political climate under the Trump administration that has aggressively rallied against diversity. Court cases alleging “reverse D.E.I.” are moving unusually quickly through the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission’s legal pipeline. The commission’s chair, Andrea Lucas, has repeatedly urged white men to file complaints if they believe they were harmed by DEI.

As these members depart, the absence of Black voices in the House Republican caucus highlights the ongoing tension between the party’s institutional goals and its current internal direction.

“It’s going to be really hard for even the most conservative Black Republican to look at this Republican Party and defend it,” said Chris Taylor, a senior adviser to the Congressional Black Caucus PAC, to the Times. “This is a Republican Party that is at war with Black America.”