Federal Agencies Neglect Anti-Asian Discrimination in Education

Ilya Somin:

My wife, Alison Somin (an attorney with the Pacific Legal Foundation, and former special assistant at the US Commission on Civil Rights) has an article about anti-Asian discrimination in education, and how federal agencies have mostly ignored it:

Discrimination against Asian-American students in admissions at selective universities has been an open secret for decades. An entire cottage industry even coached ambitious applicants on how to be less Asian. Data produced in litigation showed that for applicants with academic credentials in the top 10 percent of Harvard’s pool, the odds of admission were 56.1 percent for African Americans, 31.3 percent for Hispanics, and 15.3 percent for whites, but only 12.6 percent for Asian Americans. In emails uncovered in the parallel lawsuit against the University of North Carolina, admissions officers were candid about preferring applicants of other races over Asian Americans. One representative exchange: “perfect 2400 SAT All 5 on AP one B in 11th” “Brown?!” “Heck no. Asian.”

Yet the federal agencies charged with enforcing civil rights laws prohibiting this discrimination largely have done nothing in response. These agencies could have issued guidance emphasizing that such discrimination is forbidden or pursued targeted investigations against universities widely suspected of discrimination. But they have not….