Bradley Gayton is the former general counsel for the Coca-Cola corporation. In 2021, Gayton abruptly resigned from the position after creating controversial diversity policies regarding outside law firms hired by the company. ^[1] The diversity policies included requirements that law firms doing business with Coca-Cola must certify that at least 30 percent of all billable hours would be from non-white attorneys, and of that 30 percent, half would be from African-American attorneys. ^[2] Firms that failed to meet the diversity requirements risked losing all business with Coca-Cola. After Gayton’s resignation, the program was put on pause. ^[3]

Gayton was also believed to be closely tied to Coca-Cola’s “Fostering Allyship project. Tutul Rahman and Michael DiLeondardo are the co-leads on the “Fostering Allyship” project at the Coca-Cola Company. A large part of the project is the “Together We Stand, Together We Must” guidebook, which includes trainings, video testimonies, and communication tools. ^[4]  According to a statement released by Coca-Cola, the online training “Confronting Racism” encouraging white people to “be less white” was not a mandatory part of the training, but an additional resource available online. ^[5] The “Confronting Racism” training was in association with Robin DiAngelo, the author of White Fragility: Why It’s So Hard for White People to Talk About Racism. ^[6]