Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA) said universities will be doing a “terrible disservice to future leaders of this country” in the wake of the Supreme Court’s decision on considering race in university admissions unconstitutional.
“What isn't being talked about enough is the harm this is going to do for students, not just black and Latino students but white and Asian American students,” Khanna said on MSNBC on Thursday.
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“Consider students going to Harvard who want to become the future political leaders in this country — the future president, senators, congresspeople — do you think they're gonna have a better chance of doing that and doing that successfully if they're in classes that don't have adequate representation from African Americans and Latinos?” Khanna said.
The Supreme Court ruled on affirmative action Thursday, ending race-conscious college admissions through two decisions — Students for Fair Admissions Inc. v. University of North Carolina and Students for Fair Admissions Inc. v. President and Fellows of Harvard College.
The majority opinion was written Chief Justice John Roberts in both cases, with Justices Clarence Thomas, Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh issuing concurring opinions and Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote a dissenting opinion. Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson recused herself in the Harvard case due her ties to the university as a graduate of Harvard and former member on the Board of Overseers, though she wrote a dissent in the North Carolina case.
“You're doing a terrible disservice to the future leaders of this country in a multiracial, multi-ethnic democracy,” Khanna said.
California passed its own measure on affirmative action in 1996 with the Civil Rights Initiative, a ballot proposition prohibiting the state from discriminating against or allowing preferential treatment to those on the basis of race, sex, gender and other factors in employment, contracting, and admissions.
California's Proposition 209 made it the first state to ban race considerations for admissions in public institutions, leaving minimal exceptions as a way to meet previous federal standards. Washington state followed with similar measures in 1998 but rescinded the affirmative action ban in 2022. Several other states prevent the use of race in admissions to public colleges and universities.
Khanna said he can “understand some of the sentiment” regarding support for the Supreme Court’s decision, emphasizing he represents California's 17th Congressional District, which contains a significant proportion of Asian Americans.
“What I say to people in my own district is many people in the Asian American community wouldn't have been in America if it weren't for the civil rights movement,” Khanna said. “The civil rights movement led to the 1965 Immigration Reform Act."
“That's what allowed people from Asia to start immigrating to the United States. So we owe an enormous debt to the civil rights movement,” he continued.
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According to 2020 statistics from Data USA, Asian people (non-Hispanic) make up around 56% of the population in the 17th District, encompassing cities in Santa Clara and Alameda counties.
“The reality is race matters. Race is consequential to people's lives. And so if we are being honest about the adversity folks face, the challenges they overcome, they're going to talk about race.” Khanna said. “Colleges are going to have to figure out how they do that while being consistent with the court decision.”