The Supreme Court of the United States has ruled that affirmative action, the practice of considering how structural factors due to race have impacted applicants to universities, is unconstitutional and no longer permitted to be used in the college admissions process.
According to an ASU spokesperson, the decision will have no effect on any prospective students regardless of state status.
In a statement, ASU said the decision "will have no impact on the diversity of the Arizona State University student body or ASU's commitment to having a student body which reflects the population of the State of Arizona."
The 6-3 ruling on Students for Fair Admission v. President and Fellows of Harvard College and Students for Fair Admissions, Inc. v. University of North Carolina was revealed Thursday morning and could change admissions policies, processes and results at universities across the country.
Chief Justice John Roberts, who was joined in the majority by the Court’s remaining five conservative Justices, wrote in his opinion that affirmative action policies like those employed at Harvard violate the 14th Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause because they “lack sufficiently focused and measurable objectives warranting the use of race, unavoidably employ race in a negative manner, involve racial stereotyping, and lack meaningful endpoints.”
In dissent were the Court’s three liberals. Justice Sonia Sotomayor, an Obama appointee and the Court’s longest-tenured liberal, wrote in her dissent that this decision “cements a superficial rule of colorblindness as a constitutional principle in an endemically segregated society where race has always mattered and continues to matter.”
Nine states have previously outlawed race-conscious admissions at public universities, and enrollment rates for Black and Latino students have dropped dramatically at their most selective schools.
President Joe Biden, in a speech from the White House after the decision’s release, said: “I believe our colleges are stronger when they are racially diverse, and our nation is stronger, because we are tapping into the full range of talent in this nation.”
He also said that the idea of affirmative action being used to admit unqualified students to universities, a common refrain among those who oppose the policy, is a myth.
“(Universities) should not abandon their commitment to ensure student bodies have diverse backgrounds and experiences that reflect all of America," he said.
Edited by Shane Brennan, Angelina Steel
Reach the reporter at awakefi3@asu.edu and follow @_alexwakefield on Twitter.
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