YOUR ACTION: Call the Department of Justice
202-353-1555
On August 1st, the New York Times revealed details of an internal Department of Justice document they obtained that describes plans by the Civil Rights Division to crack down on university ‘affirmative action’ policies. In the document, the department is seeking lawyers to investigate and potentially sue universities for discriminating against white applicants (“intentional race-based discrimination”) in their admissions processes. Typically, the Educational Opportunities Section of the DoJ handles university matters, but due to reported unwillingness by these career civil servants/education experts to reverse course on civil rights, the political appointee staffed Civil Rights Division will handle this project.
This new affirmative action project falls in line with other actions taken by Jeff Sessions and the DoJ that attack civil rights and equal opportunity for minority American populations. The continuing systemic racial discrimination and oppression in our society often makes it harder for young people of color to obtain the same educational resources as their white counterparts. Affirmative action admissions programs allow students from these disadvantaged backgrounds more balanced access to higher education. The Supreme Court has also ruled that a diverse student body has its own educational benefits, allowing universities to use race as an admission factor.
While many white students have criticized and waged lawsuits against affirmative action, claiming unfair rejections in favor of “less qualified” students, the statistics simply don’t line up. In fact, white women are the primary beneficiaries of affirmative action policies. University ‘legacy’ policies also grant admission to students from predominantly white families, regardless of their performance level. A glaring example of this practice is Jared Kushner’s acceptance into Harvard to the surprise of many of his teachers who thought he was not qualified. (His father also donated $2.5M to the school.)
YOUR ACTION: Call the Department of Justice
202-353-1555
(Why you’re calling this office:
This organization is driving legislation related to the issue.)
Your script:
Hi, my name is [NAME] and I’m a constituent from _________.
I’m calling to express my serious disapproval of the Department’s plans to investigate and sue universities because of their affirmative action admissions policy. This is clearly another attempt by this Department to deny equal opportunity to minority Americans in order to perpetuate white privilege, and I demand this project be shut down immediately.
Thank you for your time and attention.
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