Critics have feared that the Supreme Court’s refusal to take up Coalition for TJ v. Fairfax County School Board — in which clear evidence showed the county to have intentionally reduced Asian enrollment at Thomas Jefferson HS — will allow schools and colleges to continue to pursue unconstitutional racial balancing.
As Justices Alito and Thomas lamented in their Coalition for TJ dissent last month, the lower court’s “reasoning [is] a virus that may spread if not promptly eliminated.” And it is spreading.
Colleges and universities openly follow this blueprint for evading judicial scrutiny. But there is a greater problem at play here: Those schools discriminate — at least in part — because their federal funding requires it.
The federal government conditions approximately $1 billion of grants each year on schools certifying prescribed racial balances for their student bodies.
Specifically, the little-known Minority Serving Institution programs only fund schools (not including HBCUs or Tribal colleges) whose student bodies meet arbitrary percentage requirements for particular races or ethnicities: 40% Black, 25% Hispanic, 20% Alaskan Native, or 10% Native Hawaiian.
Continue reading the entire piece here at the New York Post
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Dan Morenoff is the executive director and secretary of the American Civil Rights Project. Based on a recent issue brief.
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