On Governor Gavin Newsom’s Desk — A Bill That Would Codify Racial Discrimination in College Admissions

California voters amended their state constitution in 1996 to bar racial discrimination in college and university admissions. Lawmakers and administrators have been resisting ever since.

For those who don’t know, the U.S. Constitution and federal law bars racial discrimination. But when acceptance of black and Hispanic applicants decreased in California after the ballot initiative passed, school administrators reverted to the same old playbook: discriminating against individuals based on race.

California colleges and universities began using a proxy for race called “holistic” admissions, purporting to consider the “whole” application when deciding which applicants to accept or reject. Holistic admissions obviously include factors other than grades and standardized exam scores.

This practice undermined the spirit of the law. If race can’t be used, proxies for race can’t be used.

Now California lawmakers are trying to codify racial discrimination. They recently passed a bill that would allow government-funded institutions to consider applicants’ lineage of slavery in admissions.

In the context of the U.S., “lineage of slavery” is also a proxy for race — and the bill is on Governor Gavin Newsom’s desk. From Campus Reform:

The California Association of Black Lawyers has also backed the measure, with Secretary Tiega Varlack telling lawmakers it “focuses on descendants of enslaved people, a legal term of ours that gives us a better chance of surviving legal scrutiny.”

Many legally oppose this bill and declare it unconstitutional, an attempt to skirt the Trump administration’s push for universities across the country to comply with Title VI.

The U.S. Supreme Court, the U.S. Constitution, federal law, and President Donald Trump’s executive order all ban the use of racial preferences under any name.

The truth is so simple, a child can understand: the only way to end racial discrimination is to stop discriminating based on race.

Photo credit: By [2] – [1], CC BY-SA 3.0, Wikimedia Commons