Brooklyn, NY – The Supreme Court of the United States today severely restricted affirmative action at colleges and universities nationwide, ruling that consideration of an applicant’s minority race or ethnicity in admissions is an act of racial discrimination. (Read the ruling here.)
Assemblymember Rodneyse Bichotte Hermelyn issues the following statement in response:
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“The Supreme Court’s decision to overturn the longstanding precedent of affirmative action in higher education is a devastating blow to equitable and accessible education for all.
The conservative wing of the Court ruled affirmative action admissions policies from the University of North Carolina (UNC) and Harvard were unconstitutional, rolling back decades of progress and reverting us towards the era when UNC didn’t admit Black students and Harvard limited the number of Jewish students.
This will have nationwide reverberations, including undermining workplace diversity programs, while setting a dangerous precedent unraveling the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment.
SCOTUS is turning a blind eye to the glaring racial inequities and discrimination that minorities face, and not just in college admissions. We cannot pretend to be colorblind when your race still matters–statistically affecting everything from your likelihood to becoming incarcerated to being employed.
As Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, the first Black woman Supreme Court Justice, said in her dissent of the ruling, “deeming race irrelevant in law does not make it so in life.”
Meanwhile, why aren’t legacy admissions, which favor the privileged and wealthy, being challenged?
I support UNC’s and Harvard’s disappointment in the decision, and call on all colleges to follow in UNC’s actions of “bringing together talented students with different perspectives and life experiences” to “continue to make an affordable, high-quality education accessible to the people.’”
