Justice Dept to tackle college admissions racial discrimination, left freaks out (Update: Fake News?)
Chief Justice Roberts had it right: “The way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race.”
If a report in the NY Times is accurate, the Trump administration is getting ready to take on the most precious of liberal dogmas, the institutionalized racial discrimination in college admissions, aka affirmative action.
The Times reaches the conclusion that affirmative action will be under attack, even though the documents it has obtained for its reporting don’t actually say that. The Times reports, Justice Dept. to Take On Affirmative Action in College Admissions:
The Trump administration is preparing to redirect resources of the Justice Department’s civil rights division toward investigating and suing universities over affirmative action admissions policies deemed to discriminate against white applicants, according to a document obtained by The New York Times.
The document, an internal announcement to the civil rights division, seeks current lawyers interested in working for a new project on “investigations and possible litigation related to intentional race-based discrimination in college and university admissions.”
The announcement suggests that the project will be run out of the division’s front office, where the Trump administration’s political appointees work, rather than its Educational Opportunities Section, which is run by career civil servants and normally handles work involving schools and universities.
The document does not explicitly identify whom the Justice Department considers at risk of discrimination because of affirmative action admissions policies. But the phrasing it uses, “intentional race-based discrimination,” cuts to the heart of programs designed to bring more minority students to university campuses.
There is the predictable freak out, particularly from virtue-signaling white liberals.
Trump is exactly the white supremacist he showed himself to be during the campaign. Now our tax dollars will defend white rights. Hideous.
— Lisa Bloom (@LisaBloom) August 2, 2017
White supremacy in action. // Justice Dept. to Take On Affirmative Action in College Admissions – The New York Times https://t.co/twfIwEO01E
— Seth Haines (@sethhaines) August 2, 2017
Dear Justice Department,
We'll save you some time:
THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS REVERSE RACISM.https://t.co/4gRtTaAxpk
— Women's March (@womensmarch) August 2, 2017
I can't wait to hear about affirmative action from the rich white man who can barely string a sentence together but somehow became POTUS
— Nathalie Baptiste (@nhbaptiste) August 2, 2017
Race-based affirmative action has barely survived constitutional challenges in the courts, most recently in Fisher v University of Texas at Austin.
But just because it is legal to engage in institutional racial discrimination in college admissions doesn’t mean it’s a good idea.
In fact the primary victims of race-based college admissions are people of Asian descent, occupying a place that Jews used occupy in campus admissions discrimination. It it well-documented that moving away from objective factors (grades, test scores) in the name of diversity means that applicants of Asian descent have to score substantially higher relative to other groups, even to whites. Lawsuits and administrative complaints have been filed alleging just such discrimination in admissions:
Murky, “holistic” admissions policies have shut out highly qualified Asian-American students at Ivy League schools for years, says a complaint that seeks federal intervention at Brown University, Dartmouth College and Yale University.
The Asian American Coalition for Education (AACE) filed the complaint with the Departments of Justice and Education Monday, stating that as the population of college-age Asian Americans has grown in the past 20 years, their representation has leveled off or declined at Brown, Dartmouth and Yale. The group points the finger at the schools’ “highly subjective and discriminatory” admissions decisions.
“The so-called ‘Holistic’ evaluation of applicants by Ivy League colleges disproportionately penalizes Asian-American applicants during the admission process, allowing admissions officers to unreasonably perceive Asian-Americans’ academic strengths as weaknesses and to unjustifiably give Asian-American students low scores in non-academic areas,” a summary of the complaint reads.
I agree with Chief Justice Robert’s sentiment that “The way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race.”
That such a concept is seen as heresy on campuses tells you how entrenched institutionalized racial discrimination has become.
UPDATE: So, was the NY Times report fake news? According to a statement released by DOJ, the initiative mentioned by the Times was specific to complaints by Asian Americans:
The Justice Department says it does not have broad plans to investigate whether university admissions policies discriminate against students based on race.
Spokeswoman Sarah Isgur Flores says a job posting within the Civil Rights Division was related to a complaint filed by a coalition of 64 Asian-American associations in May 2015. They sued Harvard University, saying that school and other Ivy League institutions are using racial quotas to admit students other than high-scoring Asians.
Flores says the department has not received or issued any further directive on university admissions in general. She adds that the department is “committed to protecting all Americans from all forms of illegal race-based discrimination.”
Well, if DOJ does not have a plan to try to eliminate institutionalized racial discrimination in admissions, it should.
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Comments
Good!
And about time…!!!
There is no “reverse-discrimination”. There’s just discrimination. (See the period?)
The Law is (or should be) color-blind. It’s an American value that we have no privileged classes.
Absolutely! So lets make sure the educational opportunities provided to children is not dependent on their income or color. Then the very best will get the very best. Anyone here want to claim that blacks are inferior? That would be racist – pure and simple.
Discrimination based on race is the definition of racism and that is exactly what affirmative action is.
You’re inferior, and yellow.
This betrays your own racial bias.
See, Conservatives do not think in terms of “groups”. We think in terms of individuals. We don’t care about skin color, gender, or any extraneous bullshit. We want people…that’s individual people…to succeed and realize the greatest flowering of their potential and hard work.
OTOH, “affirmative action” affirms only that certain minorities cannot compete. The have to be borne up by “the white man’s burden”. That’s sick, and it hurts minorities worst of all, though it hurts all of us by virtue of a continuing racial, ethnic, and gender divide. We’d be delighted to see that ended, and it was well on its way prior to Barracula.
Well, this will get the Left’s knickers in a knot. Just like that the Times will be forgiven for the truth telling about the women’s march. That’s the way it works.
Lisa Bloom’s tweet “our tax dollars will defend white rights. Hideous” exemplifies true racism.
The only ‘aggrieved minorities’ Lisa Bloom fights for are the lawyers in the race-hustling industry.
Interesting that the left is so certain this will be about whites.
It would be very clever to leak this, let the left get itself into high dudgeon, and then announce a new task force on systematic discrimination against Americans of Asian descent.
I, for one, look forward to arguments made at the University of California that Asian Americans haven’t suffered from discrimination or prejudice.
It would be clever – but that is not how it will play out.
The document, an internal announcement to the civil rights division, seeks current lawyers interested in working for a new project
Unfortunately, this sounds like a good way to recruit the same ol’ racist liberals for this “new project”.
If this project is handled like “business as usual”, nothing useful will happen. There’s no novel argument presented, it’s just a statement of the bloody obvious. And America’s well-developed racism industry is doubtless prepared for it.
The left has done some work and had some success bringing asians into their cult of hating white people. I think they might be able to pull off prioritizing hating white people over having fair admissions policies. They will do it by convincing asians that they are being discriminated against by white people in admissions, rather than being displaced by underqualified Affirmative Action acceptees. And the solution? Affirmative Action guarantees for asians! Yaaaaay problem solved!!!
Racial preferences (“Affirmative Action”) is a clear violation of Title VI of the 1964 Civil Rights Act and of the US Constitution and SCOTUS, and other federal judges, know it but we have liberal, misguided bleeding-heart judicial activism. It needs to end even for the benefit of minorities.
Great read and don’t miss the fantastic video clip.
Patrice Lewis | Racism, the single most powerful weapon in the left’s arsenal
http://www.conservatives4palin.com/2017/07/patrice-lewis-racism-the-single-most-powerful-weapon-in-the-lefts-arsenal.html
Affirmative action was sold to this country as a short-term remedy for proven discrimination. Like the footnote about short bus rides in Brown v. Board of Education, it was used by people of ill will to create a monster.
I’ll bet the justices who approved of this remedy never imagined the resulting injustice.
Yes, and before that we had Plessy v. Ferguson. Now tell me with a straight face that there was ever such a thing as ‘Separate but Equal’.
I thought the Supreme Court resolved this very issue 40 years ago in Regents of the University of California v. Bakke, 438 U.S. 265 (1978).
https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/438/265
In 1964, White Americans supported and worked for the equal treatment of non-white citizens. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 would not have been passed without the support of a majority of White Americans. White America, acknowledging the inequities faced by much of Black America, supported the aims of affirmative action to eliminate those inequities. But, after 50 years, it is simply not working. After half a century, race based, social inequities should have been eliminated. After giving preferential treatment to a specific group, within American society, for 50 years, in order to reverse social inequities, it can no longer be claimed that any such alleged inequities are the result of the actions of the majority of society.
White America supported programs such as affirmative action as responsible members of society. During the last 50 years, they have borne the burden of that policy. But, it has become clear that if alleged race based social inequities still exist, it is not the fault of White America and that segment of the population should not bear the burden of such inequities. Affirmative action is a failure, on the whole. It is now time to embrace the concept of legal equality for all. If one can not meet a rational performance based criteria, they that person should not be given preferential treatment based upon irrelevant characteristics.
Really? Why don’t you try walking in a black mans shoes for a while and see if we have been magically transformed into a color blind society.
Besides if you are passed over because of the slots reserved for ‘affirmative action’, then you weren’t so hot, anyway.
While you are at it, did you realize that it is easy to get into top college if you come from Montana than NY because of geographical diversity.
I would very happily walk in the shoes of any number of minority professionals who are extended preferential treatment on the basis of their skin color, surname, and gender.
I’ll trade places any day with Denzel Washington, Oprah, Barracula, Holder, Lynch, or Mariah Carrie, who CHOSE to identify as black. Now, explain to me that there is no “black privilege”.
My ex and her sister (black women both) were the first of their family to leave their small NJ, pine woods home town and get college educations. My ex went so far as getting her PhD and I believe her sister had a master’s. Neither of them benefited from either superior public schools (because their schools weren’t superior) or racial quotas. Both were intelligent, hard-working, motivated, and highly organized individuals, even though their parents were functionally illiterate.
Black Americans can give themselves the help they need by restoring their families, adopting positive attitudes, adopting appropriate role models, and plain hard work. Today, only a racist would think black Americans are so inferior to whites academically that they would need help competing. They do not. They need a collective kick in the butt. As my ex was wont to say whenever a story of blacks’ dissolute behavior appeared in the news “My people will never get anywhere.” Most other black people despised her because she “acted white”, by which they meant she was successful because she spoke proper English and went to good universities.
I spent much of three decades working in mostly sociology-economically depressed black areas. Know what I found? Black people want the same things as white people. They want to live in a peaceful neighborhood surrounded by peaceful people. They want to get up in the morning and go off to a relatively secure good paying job. They want their children to be able to attend a high quality school. And, they want to be able to provide their children with more advantages than they had. Sound familiar? In fact, the black people who wanted those things were fleeing to predominantly white neighborhoods as soon as they could qualify for a loan. And, guess what? Except for the color of their skin, they were almost identical to the people already living in those areas.
What happened in America, is that the Democrats saw a way to benefit from the Civil Rights Movement and the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which they nearly unanimously fought against. They embarked upon a plan to make the black community dependent upon them by convincing Black Americans that American society was their enemy which sought to oppress them and by buying their support through social welfare programs. These social welfare programs were designed to destroy the Black family by penalizing married couples. And, they bought willing support from the racial grievance industry. But, it gets even more insidious. Intellectuals and racial grievance participants convinced Black Americans that they were different, than other Americans, and should develop their own separate culture, which was counter to the existing culture in this country. Black society created their own apartheid. They set up not just a separate-but-equal society for themselves, but they demanded that it be separate-but-superior to the rest of the nation. White society did not force blacks to live in ghettos. The society that Black America created for itself did that.
Black people, both men and women, rise to greatness within the dominant society of this country constantly. How do they do it? The same way members of the dominant culture do it, by adopting the characteristics of the dominant culture. This is how societies work. But, by convincing themselves that they are special and should not have to conform to the standards of the dominant culture, Black Americans limited their options in society.
Now as to your claim that if a white person is passed over in favor of a minority because of affirmative action, then that white person was not so hot anyway. Well, in the 1970s that happened to me three times. I had better qualification, scored higher on the employment tests and met the same physical requirements as the other applicants. I ended up with a 30+ year career consisting of above average performance. The three minorities that I lost out two were all out of the profession within 6 years and all for criminal violations; drug possession and sale, armed robbery and grand theft. Perhaps this was just a fluke. Then again, perhaps not.
The real progress may actually happen through the Dept. of Education. DOE approves entities that grant certifications to schools, and DOE pushes down requirements on AA, “diversity, “inclusion”, and racial reporting. Remove the federal mandates from DOE and then use the DOJ.
Good start, but a better, more permanent solution would be eliminating the entire agency. Can anyone name any good they provide for the almost $80 billion that we give them, year after year after year?
It is well beyond time to end the marxists’ preference for running everything in the country on the principle of “Losers First.”
The tax code, educational admissions, hiring practices (particularly in the government and academia), promotion practices, and even healthcare are run according to the principle. And some people wonder why America’s best days may be behind it.
That’s correct – when losers go first, the likes of pseudo-intellectuals like fareeed whathisname ‘barach hussein obama’,(or whoever he really is), ‘master legislator’ crazy pelosi govern the losers, soviet-style – and rob them blind.
If Trump is serious about eliminating race discrimination, he could start with an executive order prohibiting it at our national parks, forests, monuments and BLM lands, where you hardly ever see a Black, Brown or Red face. They are all lily white, like country clubs, except perhaps for Yosemite, which is flooded with Asians.
Research into this fact may well show that our Blacks, Native Americans and Hispanics just don’t care to frequent national reserves. If that is so, Trump could simply require that entrance fees be levied to pay for their acquisition and maintenance instead of taxpayer dollars.
I myself have a $10 pass that entitles me, along with all occupants of my van, to free admission to national lands and to further discounts for some services. The last time I took a tour of the West’s public lands, I counted 6 non-white faces out of some 6,000 visitors, except for Yosemite, which seemed to be a park in SE Asia.
Based on your idea, we should charge the white devils entering the parks for free, and in kind, cut all the free sh-t most whites don’t receive.
Hang onto your obamaphone, food stamps, welfare, affirmative action benefits, ability to remain in the US illegally, and the like – they’ll be disappearing under your plan.
See my reference above to my ex. Her PhD dissertation was about why American blacks are nearly absent from wildland-based outdoor activities, such as hiking, climbing, white-water rafting, etc. (Title: Perspectives on African-American attitudes toward the importance and value of the natural environment) She concluded that many minorities are not brought up in communities or family environments in which such activities are promoted or held in high regard. It has nothing to do with racism, it has everything to do with choices made in the communities, and they legacies and interests those communities and families pass on to their children.
“I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.” – Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr.
That works both ways.
Using that MLK quote has been determined to be racist code. Now there’s irony for you!
“Determined to be racist code…”
Determined by who? Not us.
Except to the rats of the GOPe, the days of the left’s ‘determining’ anything are over.
Only if you work very, very hard to misunderstand the point he was making.
Some people hear dog whistles even when dogs hear nothing.
Keeping racial division alive is the only way Dems can gain power. Disgusting.
Keep racial resentment alive – it is the only way for reps to stay in power.
Which so neatly explains why so many conservatives work…and have worked for decades…to see a color-blind society. One of my great hopes in life was to see the end of blacks voting as a block…against their own expressed interests…for black candidates. I still hope for the day when individual black Americans vote for their interests, though that day has been pushed back perhaps past the horizon of my life-time.
It also neatly explains what so many conservatives support good candidates of any color or ethnicity. We care about merit, not melanin.
What the JD needs to be looking into is Universities investigating sexual assault and the continued violation of the constitutional rights of the accused. Since most of these investigations are conducted from a standpoint that the accused is Guilty until Guilty, regardless of evidence or testimony.
http://www.dailywire.com/news/19251/female-student-harassed-threatened-college-after-amanda-prestigiacomo#
Professors and administrators are not qualified not competent to investigate…well pretty much anything, must less something as complicated as sexual assault.
Hey, why don’t worry about the criminal justice system where most blacks don’t even get a good lawyer and have no investigators. As high as the stakes are in college, they are a lot higher when you can land on death row without a fair trial.
There have now been enough exonerated that the truth of the above is no longer a question.
If you want to have good lawyers when you’re in trouble with the law, you should work at earning degree and then a high-paying job. When you need a good attorney, you will then be able to afford one. This method work just fine for Oprah, Bill Cosby, Loretta Lynch, OJ Simpson, and many others. If you can’t afford a good lawyer, at least try not to get into trouble. That approach can work very well too.
The easiest way to avoid needing a “good lawyer” is very simple; don’t put yourself into positions or associations where you can end up in trouble. It works for millions of americans of all colors everyday.
You piss and moan about blacks not getting “good lawyers”, perhaps that would be less of a problem if black offenders weren’t such a large percentage of the justice system.
See your “arguments” don’t beat reality and objective observation. So here is my question? When is the black community going to take responsibility for its part in its own problems?
When are blacks gonna stop killing blacks at nearly genocidal levels?
When is the black community going to do something about the massive drug problem that has been around for decades?
When is the black community going to realize that they now abort so many unwanted pregnancies that their birth rate in america is 2% lower that what it needs to be to maintain the black population in the US?
I realize that it is only a relatively small portion of the black community who have let themselves be fooled and used by people like Al Sharpton and Jessie Jackson into continuing to focus on the oppression of the past instead of striving for an actual equal future.
In the end the the truth is that race relations had made a huge improvement until the last administration and that improvement was in spite of people like you.
I have some bad news for you skippy, blacks (in fact no one) in america today has any idea what real oppression even looks like. I have been to the third world shitholes where real oppression still reigns. I have seen real oppression and violence to levels that would probably make you soil your spoiled ass little panties. So as an experiment I invite you to spend some time in those places telling those who have had limbs chopped off, or families murdered for being in the wrong tribe, or had their villages breast cut off so they couldn’t feed their babies, or children kidnapped to be turned into brainwashed child soldiers about how badly you are being oppressed.
In the end all you are is a spoiled whiney snowflake who expects everything to be handed to him because of his skin color and to that I say “go screw yourself I don’t give a shit what color you are.”
Yes, Roberts is right ““The way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race.” And Roberts had also been known to say that “we would have world peace if only we all just got along, We really, really should!”
Truly a brilliant man. Now I understand why he is on the Supreme Court.
You’re good for demonstrating the sheer idiocy of the commie left.
You’re mocking the man for having a firm grasp on the obvious. So you acknowledge, in your mockery, that he is correct. The reason why this platitude has to be said, however, is because it is not obvious to so many people, and it is not how law, policy, and custom now actually works – so it must said until everyone acknowledges its sagacity. Only then can it be left unsaid, because it will then be unnecessary to say it.