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| Asian Americans join other students of color in their support for Harvard's admission policies. |
Harvard University and its supporters, girding themselves for the possible dismantling of affirmative action, filed a host of friend of the court briefs Monday.
With Asan Americans reportedly alleging that Harvard discriminated against them in its admissions process, it is noteworthy that some of the strongest arguments on behalf of affirmative action came from Asian American groups and individuals.
Faced with an ultra conservative Supreme Court that through its reversal on Roe v. Wade demonstrated it has no respect for legal precedent, the Ivy League school , business, educators and legal organizations filed friends of the court briefs supporting the need for diversity in higher education and in the real world. The Supreme Court is expected to rule on the Harvard case in ints next session which begins Oct. 1.
The Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund, filed a brief on behalf of itself and 121 other Asian groups or individuals) that said, “The notion that race-conscious admissions policies discriminate against Asian Americans relies on and perpetuates harmful stereotypes against Asian Americans. The Asian American community is vast and varied, including first-generation college students and children whose parents’ professions secured their immigration; children of working-class refugees and multigenerational Americans; speakers of over 300 languages; aspiring entrepreneurs, artists, teachers and more.”
Margaret Fung, AALDEF executive director, said: “Significantly, not a single Asian American applicant offered testimony claiming to be a victim of discrimination. Harvard’s individualized admissions process, which takes race into account, actually helps to dispel the harmful ‘model minority’ myth by recognizing the vast ethnic, language, and socioeconomic diversity within the Asian American community.”
Despite some attempts by nonAsian media to paint a deep divide among AANHPI, a number of polls, including a survey by AAPIData showed that Asian Americans overwhelmingly support affirmative action, three-to-one.
Asian Americans Advancing Justice (Advancing Justice) filed two amicus briefs Monday before the U.S. Supreme Court in SFFA v. Harvard, affirming its longstanding support for race-conscious admissions in higher education.“For centuries, communities of color, including Asian Americans, have struggled against racial discrimination and faced systemic barriers to education, employment, and immigration, among other challenges,” said John C. Yang, President and Executive Director of Advancing Justice – AAJC. “Race, ethnicity, and our lived experiences are integral parts of our personal story and collective history. Holistic admissions ensures all students have the opportunity to share their whole story in addition to their academic achievements.”
The amicus brief affirms that Harvard and UNC’s race-conscious admissions programs do not discriminate against AAPI students, but rather expand their access to higher education. The brief also highlights the educational benefits of racial diversity for AAPI communities and asserts that eliminating the consideration of race in admissions programs will harm AAPI and other students of color.
“Our communities know better than to give into extremist strategist Edward Blum’s years-long mission to deny Black, Latinx, Asian American, and other communities of color equal voting rights and educational opportunities,” said Aarti Kohli, Executive Director of Advancing Justice - Asian Law Caucus. “As a parent, my children have had more chances to grow and thrive because of affirmative action, diversity, and anti-discrimination programs in our education systems. As a civil rights lawyer, there’s no question these attacks on the constitutionality of race conscious programs are a thinly veiled strategy to limit educational opportunities for all students of color.”
Students for Fair Admissions headed by anti-affirmative action activist Edward Blum filed the complaint against Harvard in 2014. The lower courts have ruled in favor of Harvard.'s admission policies.
Blum hopes the current conservative majority in the Supreme Court will overturn the concept of affirmative action which has survived four earlier SCOTUS cases. The conservative majority of Justices demonstrated they have no problem overturning long-standing precedent when in June they ruled, 6-3, against Roe v. Wade, which gave women the right to abortion.
Harvard also got a big boost when big tech companies led by Apple and Google filed a brief asked the Supreme Court not to do away with affirmative action, saying the companies seek racial diversity when hiring employees.
They were among roughly 70 companies in the technology, finance and health care industries staking a claim in one of the high court’s most watched cases during its next term.
"Diverse workforces improve … business performance — and thus strengthen the American and global economies. [The companies] seek employees who have been educated at universities with exposure to a broad array of life experiences and viewpoints, and who can bring diverse perspectives and experiences to the workplace,” the 47-page brief read.
Some of the other major companies that signed onto the brief include Airbnb, American Airlines, American Express, Dell Technologies, Johnson & Johnson, Mattel, PayPal, Meta Platforms, Starbucks, The Hershey Company, The Kraft Heinz Company, Uber, United Airlines and Walgreens Boots Alliance.
Harvard's defenders included a host of other universities who point to the 1978 case of Regents of University of California v Bakke, where the high court ruled that racial quotas were unlawful, but consideration of race as one part of an admissions factor is constitutional.
The president of the University of California system and chancellors of UC’s 10 campuses said their system was an example of what the court should avoid.
“For the past 25 years, UC has served as just such a laborator(y) for experimentation,” the brief said. “After Proposition 209 (which banned affirmative action) barred consideration of race in admissions decisions at public universities in California, freshmen enrollees from underrepresented minority groups dropped precipitously at UC, and dropped by 50% or more at UC’s most selective campuses. Since then, UC has implemented numerous and wide-ranging race-neutral measures designed to increase diversity of all sorts, including racial diversity … Those programs have enabled UC to make significant gains in its system-wide diversity.
"Yet despite its extensive efforts, UC struggles to enroll a student body that is sufficiently racially diverse to attain the educational benefits of diversity. The short-fall is especially apparent at UC’s most selective campuses, where African American, Native American, and Latinx students are underrepresented and widely report struggling with feelings of racial isolation.”
Hoping to sway the six Catholic Supreme Court Justices, Georgetown University filed a brief as part of a joint effort with 56 Catholic institutions, including the University of Notre Dame, the College of the Holy Cross, DePaul University and Villanova University. Their brief affirms that the right to consider racial diversity in a holistic admissions process to build a diverse student body and learning environment is essential to their academic and religious missions. Achieving racial diversity in admissions, the brief asserts, is “inextricably intertwined” with Catholic universities and colleges’ religious foundations.
The brief also argues that this right is rooted in the First Amendment’s Free Speech and Free Exercise Clause, particularly for Catholic higher education institutions, whose ability to have discretion in how they choose students is critical to their religious missions.
Harvard's own student and alumni amici attested to how a diverse campus benefits all students, including addressing racial isolation and increasing cross-racial understanding and cultural competency that better prepared them for their professional careers.
Asian American amici, some who testified in court, also affirmed benefiting from race-conscious admissions policies at Harvard, which provided them the opportunity to share their whole story, including their race and ethnicity, background, and diverse experiences. Asian American students which the Students for Fair Admissions purport to represent offered no in-person testimony.
“Absolute neutrality has never been a universal constitutional principle,” Harvard argued in its own behalf, saying that the framers of the Constitution’s 14th Amendment saw race-conscious measures as necessary to ensure Black people’s “equal participation in society” following the Civil War.
Harvard’s website cites Asian American student acceptance at 25.9% and African American students at 15.9% out of 2,320 total. Lower courts have ruled in favor of Harvard and UNC, but the university remains steadfast in its mission to diversify its student body.
“Harvard has repeatedly studied and continues to evaluate the importance of student-body diversity to its educational objectives and whether a race-conscious admissions process remains necessary to achieve them,” Harvard's brief said. “But as the district court observed, ‘we are not there yet.’”
“No alternative is presently workable,” states Harvard. “Until that changes, Harvard must be allowed to consider race as one of many characteristics in admissions to achieve the compelling benefits of student-body diversity.”
The Advancing Justice brief affirms that Harvard and UNC’s race-conscious admissions programs do not discriminate against AAPI students, but rather expand their access to higher education. The brief also highlights the educational benefits of racial diversity for AAPI communities and asserts that eliminating the consideration of race in admissions programs will harm AAPI and other students of color.
“For too long, the model minority myth has propagated a false premise that AAPIs don’t benefit from race conscious admissions practices,” said Connie Chung Jose, CEO, Asian Americans Advancing Justice Southern California (AJSOCAL). “The reality is that our communities also face discrimination and barriers to opportunities that race conscious admissions can address. And for AAPI students and other students of color, having a racially diverse student body is not only important to their educational experience, but often necessary to fully articulate the hurdles, achievements, and personal development experiences intrinsic to college admissions evaluations.”
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