Legal firm America First Legal (AFL) last month sent a letter to Pete Buttigieg, secretary of the U.S. Department of Transportation, asking him to cease and desist the department’s so-called Equity Action Plan to help “level the playing field” by factoring in race in hiring, promoting, and firing.
AFL also asked the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, the House Committee on Oversight and Reform, the Office of Special Counsel, and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission to open investigations into these illegal practices. The firm is on the move again, this time against a university.
AFL filed a lawsuit against Texas A&M University for hiring faculty based on race. An excerpt:
AFL seeks declaratory and injunctive, as well as the appointment of a court monitor to oversee the A&M’s faculty hiring and its “diversity office” to ensure that the university does not violate the nation’s civil-rights laws.
Any “affirmative action” program or policy that factors in race when selecting applicants also factors in race when rejecting applicants.
Texas A&M created the Fellowship Accountability, Climate, Equity, and Scholarship, or ACES Plus, to provide $2 million to hire new mid-career and senior tenure-track people “from underrepresented minority groups.”
“White and Asian applicants do not qualify,” AFL wrote.
AFL said that Texas A&M discriminated against their client, Richard Lowery, despite his being “exceptionally well-qualified” for the position. “In so doing, Texas A&M is violating Title VI, Title IX, 42 U.S.C. § 1981(a), and the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.”
AFL and other groups committed to dismantling tax-supported racial discrimination have a long road ahead. Federal, state, and local governments have racially discriminatory policies in place, with euphemistic names like “equity” and “diversity.”
But racial discrimination in favor of black or Hispanic individuals is just as odious as discrimination against them. The “winning” side, however, usually doesn’t care much about fairness and merit.
Photo credit: By Aggie0083 at the English-language Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 3.0, link