Month: August 2020

Democratic candidate Joe Biden has been stuck in his basement all these months and now wants us all to be mandated by law to wear masks. That’s his big idea.

According to CBS News:

“Every single American should be wearing a mask when they’re outside for the next three months, at a minimum. Every governor should mandate mandatory mask-wearing,” Biden said, suggesting that widespread mask use could save 40,000 lives over the next three months. “Let’s institute a mask mandate nationwide starting immediately, and we will save lives.”

Where ya been, Joe?

Governors have already been there. Here in California and in most big-population states, we’ve been wearing masks for months — in the Walmarts, in the Targets, at the Costcos, to the doctors’ office, to the post office, on our walks — the very few places we’ve been allowed to go, and during that brief period when we could go to the gym and indoor church services. Masks do do some good, and people generally follow the idea. So to put that idea out there as if none of us have noticed is rather obnoxious. Been there, done that.

Yet Joe puts this out as his bright new idea as if no one had ever thought of it before. Why exactly would Biden’s federal mask mandate somehow make things different? This is old hat stuff by someone who just woke up and smelled the coffee that’s gone cold. He seems to have missed the different gubernatorial mandates tailored to various state needs, as well as the months and months of wearing masks, particularly in big cities. It’s not a panacea, but it has been helpful there. Yet Biden wants one-size-fits-all, and is convinced he can wave the entire problem away with this sweeping diktat.

Here’s why it’s stupid: We’ve already begun solving the problem as masks (and many other solutions) have been followed. Outdoor activities have been positive – church services, beach activity, and if California would just allow it, outdoor school would be great. Hydroxychloroquine combined with zinc and other adjacent treatments has been a lifesaver. Operation Warp Speed, to develop a vaccine, is on track for a successful year-end launch. And there are also signs of herd immunity developing. A lot of us have marveled at the low transmission rate on New York City’s packed subways, and many experts think sufficient immunity has come of it. The latest news is that it doesn’t take much for herd immunity to develop.

Yes, new cases are high but only because more testing is available – lots of undetected cases have been found, often among symptomless young people, which would have otherwise gone away unnoticed. More important, deaths are down, bigtime down, down from April, where deaths peaked at 4,928 on one bad day in that month. In late July, the last day recorded, they were at 391. Catching COVID no longer means you are going to die, because almost no one does. 

Yet for Biden, it’s still March 2020 and he’d like us all to know he’d handle the coronavirus better than President Trump did with this vast new imposition. Yes, it’s good to wear masks, but only in place where it can do some good. America has 300 million people, and a rancher in South Dakota where few COVID cases exist anyway, is going to need one a lot less than a packed multi-generational house in a Los Angeles tenement or an infirm elderly person living in a nursing home.

And an order that sweeping is also going to get ignored. We’ve already seen how spring breakers ignored it. We’ve seen how protestors, rioters, and looters ignore it. We’ve also seen farmworkers working in tight quarters from places with little understanding of viruses ignore it. And we’ve seen inner-city Black communities where multigenerational families are common and distrust of mostly white authorities handing out edicts is even more common to ignore. Some of these places do, indeed have more COVID cases. 

Seriously – 300 million people here and police budgets being cut by blue-city governments, how’s Biden going to enforce this? The old dinosaur hasn’t worked this out yet. Let’s see how he does when protestors and rioters take to the streets, forgetting their masks.

Is Joe Biden proposing to go after the rioters on mask grounds? As long as he’s got cops out issuing tickets for these mask violations, maybe he can arrest a few for hurling bombs and setting fires.

And for additional idiocy, note that Biden threw out a three-month period for it, as if the ‘experts’ he’s consulted have ever been right before. (Remember the two-week lockdowns? Funny how they extend).

First we weren’t supposed to wear masks, then we were, and in response to state orders, most of us complied. In places where Karens were present, we were scolded on the streets if we didn’t.

What most people want is not more masks – we have all had a bellyful of masks, and as Andrea Widburg noted here, some people are getting something called “mask mouth” as a result of their compliance – we want the problem solved and times to go back to normal.

Biden isn’t offering that. He’s offering the false promise of that, but he’s focused on the power to impose, not the solution, and oh gosh, it’s so old – kind of like him. When no solution comes, he’ll extend the mask mandate forever, in the name of ending all risk. And as Issues & Insights notes today, it won’t stop there.

Not only will it not work, it’s a hideous campaign platform — Joe Biden, candidate of permanent lockdown, March 2020 forever. 

Since, as Robert Conquest noted, everyone’s a conservative about things they know best, it is going to bomb with the voters. We all know this mask thing and what it can do very very well. Biden’s offering us a lot of day-old bread with nothing between the slices.

Photo illustration by Monica Showalter with use of image from Public Domain Pictures // public domain, enhanced with Photoshop.

Democratic candidate Joe Biden has been stuck in his basement all these months and now wants us all to be mandated by law to wear masks. That’s his big idea.

According to CBS News:

“Every single American should be wearing a mask when they’re outside for the next three months, at a minimum. Every governor should mandate mandatory mask-wearing,” Biden said, suggesting that widespread mask use could save 40,000 lives over the next three months. “Let’s institute a mask mandate nationwide starting immediately, and we will save lives.”

Where ya been, Joe?

Governors have already been there. Here in California and in most big-population states, we’ve been wearing masks for months — in the Walmarts, in the Targets, at the Costcos, to the doctors’ office, to the post office, on our walks — the very few places we’ve been allowed to go, and during that brief period when we could go to the gym and indoor church services. Masks do do some good, and people generally follow the idea. So to put that idea out there as if none of us have noticed is rather obnoxious. Been there, done that.

Yet Joe puts this out as his bright new idea as if no one had ever thought of it before. Why exactly would Biden’s federal mask mandate somehow make things different? This is old hat stuff by someone who just woke up and smelled the coffee that’s gone cold. He seems to have missed the different gubernatorial mandates tailored to various state needs, as well as the months and months of wearing masks, particularly in big cities. It’s not a panacea, but it has been helpful there. Yet Biden wants one-size-fits-all, and is convinced he can wave the entire problem away with this sweeping diktat.

Here’s why it’s stupid: We’ve already begun solving the problem as masks (and many other solutions) have been followed. Outdoor activities have been positive – church services, beach activity, and if California would just allow it, outdoor school would be great. Hydroxychloroquine combined with zinc and other adjacent treatments has been a lifesaver. Operation Warp Speed, to develop a vaccine, is on track for a successful year-end launch. And there are also signs of herd immunity developing. A lot of us have marveled at the low transmission rate on New York City’s packed subways, and many experts think sufficient immunity has come of it. The latest news is that it doesn’t take much for herd immunity to develop.

Yes, new cases are high but only because more testing is available – lots of undetected cases have been found, often among symptomless young people, which would have otherwise gone away unnoticed. More important, deaths are down, bigtime down, down from April, where deaths peaked at 4,928 on one bad day in that month. In late July, the last day recorded, they were at 391. Catching COVID no longer means you are going to die, because almost no one does. 

Yet for Biden, it’s still March 2020 and he’d like us all to know he’d handle the coronavirus better than President Trump did with this vast new imposition. Yes, it’s good to wear masks, but only in place where it can do some good. America has 300 million people, and a rancher in South Dakota where few COVID cases exist anyway, is going to need one a lot less than a packed multi-generational house in a Los Angeles tenement or an infirm elderly person living in a nursing home.

And an order that sweeping is also going to get ignored. We’ve already seen how spring breakers ignored it. We’ve seen how protestors, rioters, and looters ignore it. We’ve also seen farmworkers working in tight quarters from places with little understanding of viruses ignore it. And we’ve seen inner-city Black communities where multigenerational families are common and distrust of mostly white authorities handing out edicts is even more common to ignore. Some of these places do, indeed have more COVID cases. 

Seriously – 300 million people here and police budgets being cut by blue-city governments, how’s Biden going to enforce this? The old dinosaur hasn’t worked this out yet. Let’s see how he does when protestors and rioters take to the streets, forgetting their masks.

Is Joe Biden proposing to go after the rioters on mask grounds? As long as he’s got cops out issuing tickets for these mask violations, maybe he can arrest a few for hurling bombs and setting fires.

And for additional idiocy, note that Biden threw out a three-month period for it, as if the ‘experts’ he’s consulted have ever been right before. (Remember the two-week lockdowns? Funny how they extend).

First we weren’t supposed to wear masks, then we were, and in response to state orders, most of us complied. In places where Karens were present, we were scolded on the streets if we didn’t.

What most people want is not more masks – we have all had a bellyful of masks, and as Andrea Widburg noted here, some people are getting something called “mask mouth” as a result of their compliance – we want the problem solved and times to go back to normal.

Biden isn’t offering that. He’s offering the false promise of that, but he’s focused on the power to impose, not the solution, and oh gosh, it’s so old – kind of like him. When no solution comes, he’ll extend the mask mandate forever, in the name of ending all risk. And as Issues & Insights notes today, it won’t stop there.

Not only will it not work, it’s a hideous campaign platform — Joe Biden, candidate of permanent lockdown, March 2020 forever. 

Since, as Robert Conquest noted, everyone’s a conservative about things they know best, it is going to bomb with the voters. We all know this mask thing and what it can do very very well. Biden’s offering us a lot of day-old bread with nothing between the slices.

Photo illustration by Monica Showalter with use of image from Public Domain Pictures // public domain, enhanced with Photoshop.

The United States Department of Justice has placed Yale University on notice that it has been found in violation of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 by discriminating on the basis of race and national origin, putting more than half a billion dollars in yearly federal funding of the university in jeopardy

The DOJ’s letter of notification sent to Yale’s lawyers lays out the case and is worth reading in its entirety.  But here are some key findings:

Yale grants substantial, and often determinative, preferences based on race to certain racially-favored applicants and relatively and significantly disfavors other applicants because of their race. Yale’s race discrimination imposes undue and unlawful penalties on racially-disfavored applicants, including in particular Asian American and White applicants.

For example, the likelihood of admission for Asian American and White applicants who have similar academic credentials is significantly lower than for African American and Hispanic applicants to Yale College. For the great majority of applicants, Asian American and White applicants have only one-tenth to one-fourth of the likelihood of admission as African American applicants with comparable academic credentials.

Yale’s Sterling Memorial and Bass Libraries

Photo credit: Gunnar Klack licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license.

The legal burden of proof is on Yale:

To comply with Title VI, Yale cannot engage in discrimination barred by the Equal Protection Clause of the United States Constitution. See Gratz v. Bollinger, 539 U.S. 244, 276 n.23 (2003). Because Yale admits that it usesrace in admissions, Yale bears the burden of showing that it satisfies strict scrutiny. This means that Yale bears the burden of demonstrating that its use of race is narrowly tailored to serve a compelling interest. E.g., Fisher v. University of Tex. at Austin, 570 U.S. 297, 309-11 (2013) (Fisher I); Parents Involved in Cmty. Schs. v. Seattle Sch. Dist. No. 1, 551 U.S. 701, 720 (2007).

Yale asserts that it has a compelling interest in obtaining the educational benefits of diversity. Yale’s diversity “goals cannot be elusory or amorphous—they must be sufficiently measurable to permit judicial scrutiny of the policies adopted to reach them.” Fisher v. University of Tex. at Austin, 136 S. Ct. 2198, 2211 (2016) (Fisher II). Furthermore, strict scrutiny requires Yale to “prove that the means chosen by” the school to achieve its stated interest in diversity “are narrowly tailored to that goal.” Fisher I, 570 U.S. at 311.

Yale is also violating other conditions that the Supreme Court has required to justifyaffirmative action discrimination.

Proving that a race-conscious program is narrowly tailored is a “heavy burden.” Fisher II, 136 S. Ct. at 2211; Parents Involved, 551 U.S. at 747. Narrow tailoring requires, among other things, that a university use race only as a “plus” factor “in a flexible, nonmechanical way.” Grutter v. Bollinger, 539 U.S. 306, 334 (2003). Race cannot be “decisive in practice.” Gratz, 539 U.S. at 272 & n.19; accord Grutter, 539 U.S. at 337. In other words, narrow tailoring requires that race cannot be “the defining feature” of the application or “the predominant factor” that decides an applicant’s admission. Grutter, 539 U.S. at 317, 320, 337. Additionally, “racial balancing” is “patently unconstitutional” under the Equal Protection Clause, id. at 330, and thus also violates Title VI. In addition, an admissions program cannot “unduly burden individuals who are not members of the favored racial and ethnic groups.” Id. at 341 (citation omitted). Finally, a university’s “race-conscious admissions policies must be limited in time.” Id. at 342.

Applying these principles, and based on our review of information we obtained during our investigation, we have determined that Yale violated, and is continuing to violate, Title VI.

First, it appears Yale’s diversity goals are not sufficiently measurable. Our investigation indicates that Yale’s diversity goals appear to be vague, elusory, and amorphous. Yale’s use of race appears to be standardless, and Yale does virtually nothing to cabin, limit, or define its use of race during the Yale College admissions process.

Second, Yale’s race discrimination in undergraduate admissions is also not narrowly tailored. Our investigation revealed that Yale’s discrimination affects hundreds of admissions decisions each year. Yale uses race at multiple points in its admissions process.

Yale uses race when it initially rates applicants, when it again rates those previously rated applicants, and again when it considers applicants at subsequent stages of the admissions process. Yale discriminates based on race among comparable applicants to whom Yale’s own admissions staff gave identical ratings earlier in the admissions process. Yale’s use of race at multiple steps of its admissions process results in a multiplied effect of race on an applicant’s likelihood of admission. Yale’s race discrimination contrasts starkly with the program upheld in Fisher II, in which the University of Texas considered race as one “subfactor” of its multi-factor assessment of applicants, and “[t]he admissions officers who ma[d]e the final decision as to whether a particular applicant will be admitted ma[d]e that decision without knowing the applicant’s race.” 136 S. Ct. at 2206-07.

Yale’s admissions data and other information also show that the University is using race as more than just plus factors but rather as predominant criteria that in practice are determinative in many admissions decisions. Data also show that this determinative effect of race is multiplied for competitive applicants. Yale’s approach is thus a far cry from the admissions process in Fisher II, where “race [was] but a ‘factor of a factor of a factor’ in the holistic-review calculus.” Id. at 2207 (citation omitted).

Yale’s oversized use of race favors some applicants because of their race and correspondingly disfavors other applicants because of their race, with most Asian American and White applicants unduly bearing the brunt of the preferences Yale grants to its racially-preferred applicants. Yale grants racial and national origin preferences in favor of African American, Hispanic, and certain other applicants and disfavors most Asian American and White applicants. Yale’s use of race cannot satisfy the narrow tailoring requirement because Yale “unduly burden[s] individuals who are not members of the favored racial and ethnic groups.” Grutter, 539 U.S. at 341 (citation omitted).

For example, data produced by Yale show that Asian American applicants have a much lower chance of admission than do members of Yale’s preferred racial groups, even when those Asian Americans have much higher academic qualifications and comparable ratings by Yale’s admissions officers. Every year from 2000 to 2017, Yale offered admission to Asian American applicants to Yale College at rates below their proportion of the applicant pool. During this same 18-year period, Yale offered admission to White applicants at rates below their proportion of the applicant pool in a majority of years. And, every year during the same 18-year period, Yale admitted applicants to Yale College from Yale’s preferred racial groups at rates higher than their representation in the applicant pool.

Additionally, Yale’s data and other information show that Yale is racially balancing its admitted class, with the major racial groups remaining remarkably stable for approximately the last decade.

Yale’s president, Peter Salovey, is defiant, setting up a high stakes showdown:

The department’s allegation is baseless. Given our university’s commitment to complying with federal law, I am dismayed that the DOJ inexplicably rushed to conclude its investigation without conducting a fully informed analysis, which would have shown that Yale’s practices absolutely comply with decades of Supreme Court precedent.

Yale College will not change its admissions processes in response to today’s letter because the DOJ is seeking to impose a standard that is inconsistent with existing law. We will continue to look at the whole person when selecting whom to admit among the many thousands of highly qualified applicants. We will continue to look at what students have accomplished and hope to contribute to Yale and the world. We will continue to create a student body that is rich in a diverse range of ideas, expertise, and experiences. Such a student body greatly enhances students’ academic experiences and maximizes their future success. By bringing people of different backgrounds, talents, and perspectives together, we best prepare our students for a complex and dynamic world.

Yale’s admissions practices help us realize our mission to improve the world today and for future generations. At this unique moment in our history, when so much attention properly is being paid to issues of race, Yale will not waver in its commitment to educating a student body whose diversity is a mark of its excellence.

The DOJ is giving Yale 2 weeks to think over its defiance or else face a lawsuit:

We would like to secure Yale’s compliance with Title VI by voluntary means. 28 C.F.R. §§ 42.107 & 42.108; see also 42 U.S.C. § 2000d-1. To that end, Yale must agree not to use race or national origin in its upcoming 2020-2021 undergraduate admissions cycle, and, if Yale proposes to consider race or national origin in future admissions cycles, it must first submit to the Department of Justice a plan demonstrating that its proposal is narrowly tailored as required by law. Any such proposal should include an end date to Yale’s use of race.

Please be advised that if Yale does not agree to this remedial measure by August 27, 2020, we may determine that “compliance cannot be secured by voluntary means.” 28 C.F.R. § 42.108; see also 42 U.S.C. § 2000d-1. If we make that determination, the Department will be prepared to file a lawsuit

Unless Yale changes its mind (unlikley, given the arrogance on display), there is going to be an epic lawsuit with huge financial stakes. My guess is that AG Barr is confident that the evidence available is so strong that he expects to win.  

Staytuned for fireworks.

The United States Department of Justice has placed Yale University on notice that it has been found in violation of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 by discriminating on the basis of race and national origin, putting more than half a billion dollars in yearly federal funding of the university in jeopardy

The DOJ’s letter of notification sent to Yale’s lawyers lays out the case and is worth reading in its entirety.  But here are some key findings:

Yale grants substantial, and often determinative, preferences based on race to certain racially-favored applicants and relatively and significantly disfavors other applicants because of their race. Yale’s race discrimination imposes undue and unlawful penalties on racially-disfavored applicants, including in particular Asian American and White applicants.

For example, the likelihood of admission for Asian American and White applicants who have similar academic credentials is significantly lower than for African American and Hispanic applicants to Yale College. For the great majority of applicants, Asian American and White applicants have only one-tenth to one-fourth of the likelihood of admission as African American applicants with comparable academic credentials.

Yale’s Sterling Memorial and Bass Libraries

Photo credit: Gunnar Klack licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license.

The legal burden of proof is on Yale:

To comply with Title VI, Yale cannot engage in discrimination barred by the Equal Protection Clause of the United States Constitution. See Gratz v. Bollinger, 539 U.S. 244, 276 n.23 (2003). Because Yale admits that it usesrace in admissions, Yale bears the burden of showing that it satisfies strict scrutiny. This means that Yale bears the burden of demonstrating that its use of race is narrowly tailored to serve a compelling interest. E.g., Fisher v. University of Tex. at Austin, 570 U.S. 297, 309-11 (2013) (Fisher I); Parents Involved in Cmty. Schs. v. Seattle Sch. Dist. No. 1, 551 U.S. 701, 720 (2007).

Yale asserts that it has a compelling interest in obtaining the educational benefits of diversity. Yale’s diversity “goals cannot be elusory or amorphous—they must be sufficiently measurable to permit judicial scrutiny of the policies adopted to reach them.” Fisher v. University of Tex. at Austin, 136 S. Ct. 2198, 2211 (2016) (Fisher II). Furthermore, strict scrutiny requires Yale to “prove that the means chosen by” the school to achieve its stated interest in diversity “are narrowly tailored to that goal.” Fisher I, 570 U.S. at 311.

Yale is also violating other conditions that the Supreme Court has required to justifyaffirmative action discrimination.

Proving that a race-conscious program is narrowly tailored is a “heavy burden.” Fisher II, 136 S. Ct. at 2211; Parents Involved, 551 U.S. at 747. Narrow tailoring requires, among other things, that a university use race only as a “plus” factor “in a flexible, nonmechanical way.” Grutter v. Bollinger, 539 U.S. 306, 334 (2003). Race cannot be “decisive in practice.” Gratz, 539 U.S. at 272 & n.19; accord Grutter, 539 U.S. at 337. In other words, narrow tailoring requires that race cannot be “the defining feature” of the application or “the predominant factor” that decides an applicant’s admission. Grutter, 539 U.S. at 317, 320, 337. Additionally, “racial balancing” is “patently unconstitutional” under the Equal Protection Clause, id. at 330, and thus also violates Title VI. In addition, an admissions program cannot “unduly burden individuals who are not members of the favored racial and ethnic groups.” Id. at 341 (citation omitted). Finally, a university’s “race-conscious admissions policies must be limited in time.” Id. at 342.

Applying these principles, and based on our review of information we obtained during our investigation, we have determined that Yale violated, and is continuing to violate, Title VI.

First, it appears Yale’s diversity goals are not sufficiently measurable. Our investigation indicates that Yale’s diversity goals appear to be vague, elusory, and amorphous. Yale’s use of race appears to be standardless, and Yale does virtually nothing to cabin, limit, or define its use of race during the Yale College admissions process.

Second, Yale’s race discrimination in undergraduate admissions is also not narrowly tailored. Our investigation revealed that Yale’s discrimination affects hundreds of admissions decisions each year. Yale uses race at multiple points in its admissions process.

Yale uses race when it initially rates applicants, when it again rates those previously rated applicants, and again when it considers applicants at subsequent stages of the admissions process. Yale discriminates based on race among comparable applicants to whom Yale’s own admissions staff gave identical ratings earlier in the admissions process. Yale’s use of race at multiple steps of its admissions process results in a multiplied effect of race on an applicant’s likelihood of admission. Yale’s race discrimination contrasts starkly with the program upheld in Fisher II, in which the University of Texas considered race as one “subfactor” of its multi-factor assessment of applicants, and “[t]he admissions officers who ma[d]e the final decision as to whether a particular applicant will be admitted ma[d]e that decision without knowing the applicant’s race.” 136 S. Ct. at 2206-07.

Yale’s admissions data and other information also show that the University is using race as more than just plus factors but rather as predominant criteria that in practice are determinative in many admissions decisions. Data also show that this determinative effect of race is multiplied for competitive applicants. Yale’s approach is thus a far cry from the admissions process in Fisher II, where “race [was] but a ‘factor of a factor of a factor’ in the holistic-review calculus.” Id. at 2207 (citation omitted).

Yale’s oversized use of race favors some applicants because of their race and correspondingly disfavors other applicants because of their race, with most Asian American and White applicants unduly bearing the brunt of the preferences Yale grants to its racially-preferred applicants. Yale grants racial and national origin preferences in favor of African American, Hispanic, and certain other applicants and disfavors most Asian American and White applicants. Yale’s use of race cannot satisfy the narrow tailoring requirement because Yale “unduly burden[s] individuals who are not members of the favored racial and ethnic groups.” Grutter, 539 U.S. at 341 (citation omitted).

For example, data produced by Yale show that Asian American applicants have a much lower chance of admission than do members of Yale’s preferred racial groups, even when those Asian Americans have much higher academic qualifications and comparable ratings by Yale’s admissions officers. Every year from 2000 to 2017, Yale offered admission to Asian American applicants to Yale College at rates below their proportion of the applicant pool. During this same 18-year period, Yale offered admission to White applicants at rates below their proportion of the applicant pool in a majority of years. And, every year during the same 18-year period, Yale admitted applicants to Yale College from Yale’s preferred racial groups at rates higher than their representation in the applicant pool.

Additionally, Yale’s data and other information show that Yale is racially balancing its admitted class, with the major racial groups remaining remarkably stable for approximately the last decade.

Yale’s president, Peter Salovey, is defiant, setting up a high stakes showdown:

The department’s allegation is baseless. Given our university’s commitment to complying with federal law, I am dismayed that the DOJ inexplicably rushed to conclude its investigation without conducting a fully informed analysis, which would have shown that Yale’s practices absolutely comply with decades of Supreme Court precedent.

Yale College will not change its admissions processes in response to today’s letter because the DOJ is seeking to impose a standard that is inconsistent with existing law. We will continue to look at the whole person when selecting whom to admit among the many thousands of highly qualified applicants. We will continue to look at what students have accomplished and hope to contribute to Yale and the world. We will continue to create a student body that is rich in a diverse range of ideas, expertise, and experiences. Such a student body greatly enhances students’ academic experiences and maximizes their future success. By bringing people of different backgrounds, talents, and perspectives together, we best prepare our students for a complex and dynamic world.

Yale’s admissions practices help us realize our mission to improve the world today and for future generations. At this unique moment in our history, when so much attention properly is being paid to issues of race, Yale will not waver in its commitment to educating a student body whose diversity is a mark of its excellence.

The DOJ is giving Yale 2 weeks to think over its defiance or else face a lawsuit:

We would like to secure Yale’s compliance with Title VI by voluntary means. 28 C.F.R. §§ 42.107 & 42.108; see also 42 U.S.C. § 2000d-1. To that end, Yale must agree not to use race or national origin in its upcoming 2020-2021 undergraduate admissions cycle, and, if Yale proposes to consider race or national origin in future admissions cycles, it must first submit to the Department of Justice a plan demonstrating that its proposal is narrowly tailored as required by law. Any such proposal should include an end date to Yale’s use of race.

Please be advised that if Yale does not agree to this remedial measure by August 27, 2020, we may determine that “compliance cannot be secured by voluntary means.” 28 C.F.R. § 42.108; see also 42 U.S.C. § 2000d-1. If we make that determination, the Department will be prepared to file a lawsuit

Unless Yale changes its mind (unlikley, given the arrogance on display), there is going to be an epic lawsuit with huge financial stakes. My guess is that AG Barr is confident that the evidence available is so strong that he expects to win.  

Staytuned for fireworks.

ZIP |
August 14, 2020 9:32 am