The United States Supreme Court heard two affirmative action cases Monday related to allegations of discrimination at Harvard University and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
The organization Students for Fair Admissions has sued both universities over their policies favoring race as a factor in deciding admissions, otherwise known as affirmative action, which takes place in elite schools.
Students for Fair Admissions is made up of “prospective applicants and applicants to higher education institutions who were denied admission to higher education institutions, their parents, and other individuals who support the organization’s purpose and mission of eliminating racial discrimination in higher education admissions,” according to Fox News.
Members of the Asian American Coalition for Education visited The Heritage Foundation on Monday, after rallying outside the Supreme Court, where they shared with The Daily Signal that they came to the nation’s capital to fight for equal opportunity for their families.
Asked what is at stake in the current Supreme Court cases, Kenny Xu, author of “An Inconvenient Minority” and a contributor to The Daily Signal, responded: “Meritocracy. A culture of excellence.”
“We have always believed that our elite universities should be open to everybody who is qualified and who works hard to get it and has the talent to get it,” he said.
Mike Zhao, a Republican candidate for the Florida state House, said that affirmative action has led to “horrendous racial discrimination” that forces “our children” to “hide their Asian identity” when they apply to college.
“Diversity should be diversity of ideas, not diversity of skin color,” he insisted.
Washington Post polling released last week found that more than 6 in 10 Americans support banning race considerations in college admissions, though the polling also found that 64% support programs boosting student diversity.
On Monday, Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson clashed with Students for Affirmative Action attorney Patrick Strawbridge, telling him that the organization seemed to be seeking “special standing” in the case.
Strawbridge argued back that schools using affirmative action make distinctions based at least in part “on the race of the applicant.”
“Some races get a benefit,” he said. “Some races do not get a benefit.”
He added “that makes no sense in a zero-sum game. If we are going to consider race, and we argue that a racial classification—which is highly disfavored at law because of its necessarily invidious nature—is going to be used, then presumably, it must be doing some work.”
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