Starbucks agreed on Thursday to settle a Florida lawsuit over claims that its diversity efforts amounted to discrimination under state law.

At the height of corporate diversity efforts in 2020, the Seattle-based coffee giant announced a goal to have people of color in at least 30% of roles in corporate operations and 40% of retail and manufacturing roles. Starbucks said that, starting in 2021, the compensation of its CEO at the time, Kevin Johnson, and 42 other senior executives would be tied to the company’s success at meeting those goals.

Starbucks has maintained that the goals were aspirational rather than strict quotas.

But years later, those goals made Starbucks a target of several lawsuits amid a wave of legal challenges from conservative states targeting diversity, equity and inclusion programs.

Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier filed one of those lawsuits in December after assuming office earlier that year, accusing the company of “reverse discrimination” that violates the Florida Civil Rights Act.

The complaint likened Starbucks’ diversity goals to racial quotas, accused the company of paying employees different wages because of their race and alleged the company excluded people of “disfavored races” from networking and mentorship opportunities.

The state wrote in the complaint that Florida residents who worked, or applied to work, for Starbucks contacted the Attorney General’s Office because “they felt or were excluded, and even suffered humiliation, because they are white.”

In the settlement, Starbucks admits no wrongdoing or liability. However, the company agreed to pay $1 million to the Florida Department of Legal Affairs to cover legal costs, commit to complying with the Florida Civil Rights Act and “not to participate in any organizations that require increasing the racial diversity of its board of directors,” according to Uthmeier’s news release. The state says that commitment applies to Starbucks’ operations companywide.

Starbucks’ will submit annual certifications of continued compliance for four years, said the news release.

The agreement does not include any changes to Starbucks’ current programs or practices, a Starbucks spokesperson said Friday.

Pilar Ramos, Starbucks’ executive vice president and chief legal officer, said in a statement that the company was “pleased” to resolve the matter.

“We will continue to focus on offering great jobs and career opportunities to our partners who wear the green apron, while making a positive impact on the communities we serve in Florida and around the world,” she said.

Other groups have previously filed similar lawsuits targeting Starbucks’ diversity goals, but those cases were dismissed rather than settled.

The National Center for Public Policy Research, a conservative advocacy group and small Starbucks shareholder, sued Starbucks in 2022 over its diversity goals. A federal judge in Spokane dismissed the case in 2023, ruling that the issue hinged on public-policy questions for lawmakers and companies to decide rather than the judicial system.

In 2025, the state of Missouri filed a similar lawsuit against Starbucks in federal court. A federal judge dismissed the case earlier this year, ruling that the state failed to prove that the company discriminated against even a single Missouri resident in its hiring practices.

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