The Biden administration on Wednesday urged a federal judge to reject a legal challenge to the U.S. Military Academy at West Point’s consideration of race in admissions, saying that Army diversity was “integral to ensuring national security.”
The U.S. Department of Justice in a brief argued the military academy’s affirmative-action policies remain valid even after the U.S. Supreme Court’s June decision striking down race-conscious admissions policies long used by colleges to boost enrollment of Black, Hispanic and other minority students.
The conservative majority Supreme Court’s ruling came in response to lawsuits by the same group now suing over West Point’s policies in federal court in White Plains, New York. The group, Students for Fair Admissions, was founded by affirmative action opponent Edward Blum.
Blum’s group in a lawsuit filed in September alleged the academy’s admissions practices discriminated against white applicants and violated the principle of equal protection in the U.S. Constitution’s Fifth Amendment.
But the Justice Department said SFFA had no legal standing to sue over the policies and ignored “critical differences” between civilian universities such as those in the Supreme Court case and military ones like West Point, which use race in a “limited fashion to foster diversity in the Army officer corps.”
It said top U.S. military leaders “have repeatedly concluded that a more diverse officer corps makes a more effective force: more lethal, more likely to attract and retain top talent, and more legitimate in the eyes of the nation and the world.” . . . . (read more on Reuters)
DEFENDANTS’ MEMORANDUM OF LAW IN OPPOSITION TO PLAINTIFF’S MOTION FOR A PRELIMINARY INJUNCTION (pdf)
Leave a Comment