Marco Rubio bans Calibri font at State Department for being too DEI

Calibri, which is a sans-serif font, was apparently adopted in 2023 during Biden’s tenure. It was chosen by the department’s then-DEI office, which has since been disbanded under Rubio amid the Trump administration’s anti-DEI directives.

Rubio’s memo has designated Times New Roman as his tenure’s official font, stating it will “restore decorum and professionalism” to documents. Rubio did admit in the memo that Calibri wasn’t the “most illegal, immoral, radical or wasteful” example of DEI to his mind’s eye, but he still berated the font for contributing to “the degradation” of the State Department’s official correspondence.

Many people across the political spectrum dislike Calibri (according to an informal survey of TechCrunch writers) but all the same, that’s a harsh criticism for a font.

While Calibri declined to comment to TechCrunch on how woke it actually was, many people would agree that Times New Roman is a particularly old-timey font. Even the New York Times stopped using it almost two decades ago.

The State Department did not immediately respond to our request for comment.