Four Non-White Only Scholarships at U. Tennessee (Knoxville) Challenged by Equal Protection Project
Despite TN banning DEI practices at public education institutions, UT Knoxville has three scholarships only for African-Americans and a fourth only for ‘Minorities”.
Our Equal Protection Project has challenged over 265 colleges and universities covering over 730 discriminatory programs and scholarships.
Our latest filing — and first in 2026 – at the U.S. Department of Education Office for Civil Rights (OCR) was on January 6, 2026, against the University of Tennessee, Knoxville (UT), for offering, administering, and promoting four (4) scholarships that discriminate on the basis of race, color, and/or national origin in violation of Title VI.
From the Civil Rights Complaint (images omitted):
The scholarships listed below are currently offered to UT students and applicants for admission, according to the UT website, and violate Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (“Title VI”) and its implementing regulations4 by discriminating against students based on their race and skin color. Because UT is a public university, these discriminatory scholarships also violate the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.
SCHOLARSHIPS THAT VIOLATE TITLE VI (4)
1. UT Battelle Minority Scholarship:
Link: https://utk.scholarships.ngwebsolutions.com/Scholarships/Search
Archived Link: http://archive.today/WMjKG
Discriminatory Requirement: “Engineering scholarship committee selects African American students in the College of Engineering who have demonstrated academic success.”2. Messer Construction DESP Scholarship:
Link: https://utk.scholarships.ngwebsolutions.com/Scholarships/Search
Archived Link: http://archive.today/WMjKG
Discriminatory Requirement: “Engineering scholarship committee selects African American students with academic merit.”3. Fred D. Brown, Jr. Memorial Engineering Scholarship/ Fellowship Endowment
Link: https://utk.scholarships.ngwebsolutions.com/Scholarships/Search
Archived Link: http://archive.today/WMjKG
Discriminatory Requirement: “Engineering scholarship committee selects minority students in the College of Engineering.”54. Charles Lattimore Scholarship
Link: https://cehhs.utk.edu/gse/funding-options/#:~:text=Charles%20Lattimore%E2%80%93%20This%20award%20provides,eligible%20to%20receive%20this%20award
Archived Link: http://archive.today/WMjKG
Discriminatory Requirement: “This award provides financial assistance to African American students interested in pursuing a career in education.”
As we do in all cases, we then extensively provide the law as to why such race-restricted scholarships are unlawful:
The scholarships identified above violate both Title VI and the Fourteenth Amendment, by discriminating on the basis of race, skin color, or national origin.6
Title VI prohibits intentional discrimination on the basis of race, color, or national origin in any “program or activity” that receives federal financial assistance….
Regardless of UT’s reasons for offering, promoting, and administering such discriminatory scholarships, they are violating Title VI by doing so. It does not matter if the recipient of federal funding discriminates in order to advance a benign “intention” or “motivation.”
As UT is a public university, its offering, promoting, and administering these discriminatory scholarships also violates the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. In Students for Fair Admissions, the Supreme Court declared that “[e]liminating racial discrimination means eliminating all of it …. The guarantee of equal protection cannot mean one thing when applied to one individual and something else when applied to a person of another color. If both are not accorded the same protection, then it is not equal.” Id. at 206 (cleaned up). “Distinctions between citizens solely because of their ancestry [including race] are by their very nature odious to a free people whose institutions are founded upon the doctrine of equality.” Id. at 208. Consequently, “[a]ny exception to the Constitution’s demand for equal protection must survive a daunting two-step examination known … as strict scrutiny.” Id. at 208 (internal quotation marks and citation omitted). The scholarships at issue here cannot withstand that exacting standard.
We requested the OCR open an investigation.
Such race-based scholarships not only violate federal law, they also violate state law and UT’s own nondiscrimination rules, as well as recent Tennessee legislation banning DEI practices. In May 2025, Gov. Bill Lee signed into law the “Dismantling DEI Departments Act,” which applies to public colleges and universities across the state and prohibits certain DEI mandates, programs, and activities, according to reports.
Reminder: we are a small organization going up against powerful and wealthy government and private institutions devoted to DEI discrimination. Donations are greatly needed and appreciated.
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Comments
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If only we had a free press to bring these unlawful activities to be exposed to the light of public scrutiny. Thank you LI for being that beacon in the darkness.
If only we had a AG that would do her job
While I would not claim that Bondi is perfect, I view her performance as Attorney General with the understanding that she endeavors to work within the law.
Many people seem to want her to take this action or that action to deal with various problems caused by the Left, but unlike Garland before her, she actually cares about what is lawful.
Gotta eat the apple one bite at a time and the d/prog have had many decades to develop an entire orchard worth of ‘apples’. Given a choice between using scarce resources to root out a $ Trillion + worth of fraudulent payments and grifting lefty NGOs with tax free status/grant money to fund commie/anarchist agitprop and street violence OR finding a few discriminatory scholarships I’ll vote for the former every time. That said with independent investigation campaigns like the EPP teeing up easy wins for DoJ the DoJ shouldn’t hesitate to act when handed the baton.
Thank you!
You are doing great work Mr Jacobson
Dear Professor Jacobson,
I wish you’d have been at Cornell Law in 1977. One of my classmates, a white Jew from South Africa, won a very generous scholarship from Cornell that had been dedicated for students who were either Black or from Africa. When the university learned my friend was a white person, it apparently had a real problem on its hands. (Anti-discrimination laws be damned.). David ultimately conceded the scholarship. You and your colleagues are doing such important work! One more story, if you don’t mind. In the early ‘80’s one of my dearest friends, another white Jew, would argue in defense of affirmative action. Years later, he thought he’d been offered the job as the top legal officer in charge of enforcing NYS’s environmental laws (the 2nd highest legal position within the NY DEC). He asked me to find out what was going on. I called the governor’s office and was told that my friend was not getting the job, because he was neither a minority nor a woman. That was considered legal and fair at that time.