Secretary of State Marco Rubio, pictured at a ceremony on the U.S. Institute of Peace in Washington final week, has directed diplomats to deliver again Occasions New Roman as their official font.
Allison Robbert/AFP through Getty Pictures
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Allison Robbert/AFP through Getty Pictures
The State Division has reversed a Biden-era font change that aimed to make its paperwork extra accessible to readers with disabilities.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio directed diplomats around the globe to modify from Calibri to Occasions New Roman 14-point font in all official paperwork, beginning on Wednesday, the State Division mentioned in a press release to NPR. The distinction between the 2 fonts comes down to some ending strokes.
“Whether or not for inside memoranda, papers ready for principals, or paperwork shared externally, constant formatting strengthens credibility and helps a unified Division id,” the assertion mentioned.
Occasions New Roman had been the State Division’s official font for practically twenty years, from 2004 till 2023.
In accordance with the Related Press, Rubio mentioned in a cable despatched to U.S. embassies and consulates that the 2023 change, carried out by then-Secretary of State Antony Blinken, was a part of misguided range, fairness and inclusion insurance policies.
Calibri is a sans serif font, which means it does not have the ornamental tops and tails on the ends of letters that serif fonts like Occasions New Roman do.
Occasions New Roman is a serif font, with ornamental thrives, whereas the sans-serif Calibri may be simpler to learn.
NPR
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NPR
These little thrives could make the lettering more durable to learn, says Kristen Shinohara, who leads the Middle for Accessibility and Inclusion Analysis on the Rochester Institute of Expertise.
“This influence may be extra extreme for individuals with studying or studying disabilities like dyslexia or for individuals with low imaginative and prescient,” she advised NPR’s Morning Version.
The Individuals with Disabilities Act requires sans-serif fonts on bodily signage and show screens due to their relative legibility. On the identical time, serif fonts like Occasions New Roman stay the norm in print newspapers, books, authorized paperwork and extra.
“Occasions New Roman particularly, and serif fonts typically, are extra formal {and professional},” the State Division assertion mentioned. It didn’t reply to NPR’s questions on decreased accessibility.
Occasions New Roman was designed particularly for the British newspaper The Occasions within the Nineteen Twenties and shortly turned the favored typeface for a lot of different publications. It was additionally the default font of Microsoft applications like Phrase starting within the Nineteen Nineties till it was changed by Calibri — which was designed with screens in thoughts — in 2007.
Microsoft changed Calibri with a sans-serif font known as Aptos in 2023. The corporate wrote in a weblog submit on the time that Aptos’ designer, Steve Matteson, wished the font to have “the common enchantment of the late NPR newscaster Carl Kasell and the astute tone of The Late Present host Stephen Colbert.”
Small lettering, greater patterns
Rubio’s memo describes the 2023 change to Calibri as “one other wasteful DEIA program” and says it didn’t result in a significant discount within the division’s accessibility-based doc remediation circumstances, in keeping with copies obtained by Reuters and The Related Press.
The Trump administration has made no secret of its disdain for its predecessor’s deal with range, fairness and inclusion.
Trump has issued quite a few govt orders dismantling DEI initiatives in federal businesses, the overseas service, federal contracts and extra. His administration put strain on universities and public colleges, threatening to withhold federal funding from people who have DEI applications, although a choose struck down a few of these efforts in August. And rising anti-DEI backlash has additionally resulted in scores of personal corporations scaling again their very own such initiatives.
Throughout his tenure on the State Division, Rubio has already abolished workplaces and initiatives meant to foster inclusion and variety, each in D.C. and overseas.
The State Division assertion says the return to Occasions New Roman higher aligns with Trump’s “One Voice for America’s Overseas Relations” directive from February, by underscoring its “accountability to current a unified, skilled voice in all communications.”
It additionally matches into the Trump administration’s broader fixation on aesthetics, from his gilded Oval Workplace redesign to his proposal of a classically-styled D.C. arch to mark the nation’s 250th birthday to his August govt order mandating that new federal buildings prioritize classical and conventional architectural types.
And nicely earlier than the Trump administration began specifying federal businesses’ fonts, it was proscribing the phrases they might use.
The Well being and Human Providers Division eliminated complete webpages dedicated to matters like LGBTQ well being and HIV, whereas the Division of Vitality instructed workers to keep away from utilizing phrases together with “local weather change” and “sustainable.” Simply this week, court docket filings emerged displaying the administration’s six-page listing of phrases the federal Head Begin applications can not use, together with “incapacity,” “race” and “ladies.”
