Advocates are applauding a recent ruling from the U.S. Supreme Court that, at least for now, will allow race-based admissions to continue at the nation’s top military academy.
The high court refused to temporarily prohibit the consideration of race for admissions at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point. However, the conservative group behind the push remains committed to gutting the practice after previous success at blocking race admissions for colleges and universities last summer.
Students for Fair Admissions, a nonprofit legal advocacy company founded by conservative activist Edward Blum, is “trying to make it harder for Black and brown people to serve as officers in the military and attend places like West Point,” said Svante Myrick, president of People For the American Way.
The former Mayor of Ithaca, New York, told theGrio that the “extremist group” aims to stop members of the Black community from achieving the “American dream” by limiting their options and “access to higher ranks in the military.”
Blum is also behind the court case against the Fearless Fund, an organization providing grants to Black female entrepreneurs aimed that closing the gender and racial gap in venture capital funding.
Sarah Hinger, senior staff attorney at the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), told theGrio that the nonprofit organization is sending the message that “racial equity and racial diversity don’t matter.”
“That is very harmful to the military’s overall effective function,” she added.
On Friday, the Supreme Court denied a request from Students for Fair Admissions to temporarily prohibit the United States Military Academy at West Point from considering race in college admissions.
In June 2023, the majority-conservative court decided to gut the race-based admissions process at colleges and universities across the nation after Students for Fair Admissions argued that the practice discriminated against…
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