A federal judge has denied an effort to stop the U.S. Naval Academy from considering race and ethnicity in admissions, finding that the academy has a distinct interest in using affirmative action to achieve diversity in its student body, and that doing so is a matter of national security.

The decision is a blow to the hopes of an anti-affirmative action group, Students for Fair Admissions, to extend its successful challenge to race-conscious admissions at civilian schools to the nation’s military academies. In that case, against Harvard College and the University of North Carolina, the Supreme Court decided in 2023 that the race-based admissions violated the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment.

But the effort to bring those arguments to the Naval Academy “has FAILED,” U.S. Senior District Judge Richard D. Bennett of Maryland wrote in a 175-page decision filed on Thursday of the challenge to the Naval Academy.

In his decision, he wrote that there was a “compelling national security interest in a diverse officer corps in the Navy and Marine Corps.”

“The U.S. Naval Academy is distinct from a civilian university,” Judge Bennett wrote.