Justice Department investigators concluded Yale University is illegally discriminating against Asian-Americans and White applicants, the department said Thursday.
Yale “rejects scores of Asian American and White applications each year based on their race, whom it would otherwise admit,” Eric Dreiband, the head of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division wrote in a letter to Yale’s attorneys.
A Yale spokesperson said the university “categorically denies this allegation.”
The two-year investigation stemmed from a 2016 lawsuit filed against Yale, Brown and Dartmouth by the Asian American Coalition for Education.
The conclusions are the latest effort by the Trump administration to end affirmative action admissions policies at elite universities.
“Yale’s race discrimination imposes undue and unlawful penalties on racially-disfavored applications, including in particular Asian-American and White applications,” Mr. Dreiband wrote in the letter.
Mr. Dreiband wrote that Yale has been discriminating against applicants for years, using race as “the determinative factor in hundreds of admissions decisions.”
Asian-American and White students have only one-tenth to one-fourth of the likelihood of admission as African-American applicants with the comparable academic credentials, the Justice Department said.
The investigation also concluded that Yale uses race as a factor in multiple parts of the admissions process and “racially balances its classes.”
The Justice Department ordered Yale to stop using race or national origin as a basis for upcoming admissions. It also said that if Yale continues to use race or national origin as a factor in acceptance, it must submit a plan to the government proving its proposal is “narrowly tailored as required by law, including identifying the date for the end of race discrimination.”
Yale spokeswoman Karen Peart said the school has fully cooperated with the Justice Department probe, producing a “substantial amount of information and data.” But she alleged the government jumped to conclusions before Yale had finished turning over all of the documents sought by the Justice Department.
“Given our commitment to complying with federal law, we are dismayed the DOJ had made its determination before allowing Yale to provide all the information the Department has requested thus far,” she said. “Had the Department fully received and fairly weighed this information, it would have concluded that Yale’s practices absolutely comply with decades of Supreme Court precedent.”
Ms. Peart defended Yale’s application practices, saying it considers a “multitude of factors,” including academic achievement, interests, leadership and background.
“We are proud of Yale’s admissions practices and we will not change them on the basis of such a meritless, hasty accusation,” she said.
The Justice Department sees it differently, however.
“Unlawfully dividing Americans into racial and ethnic blocs fosters stereotypes, bitterness, and division,” Mr. Dreiband said in a statement. “It is past time for American institutions to recognize that all people should be treated with decency and respect and without unlawful regard to the color of their skin.”
Yale had previously denied that it has discriminated against Asian-Americans. When the investigation was announced in 2018, Yale President Peter Salovey vowed to defend “our ability to create a diverse and excellent academic community.”
Over the past 15 years, the number of Asian-American students in Yale’s incoming class increased from 14 percent to 22 percent, the school said back in 2018.
The Supreme Court has ruled colleges may use race in admissions decisions as long as it is done in a narrow way to promote diversity and for a limited time. Schools must also prove why considering race is necessary, the court said.
The Justice Department had previously made similar allegations about Harvard University. However, a federal judge last year concluded that Harvard did not discriminate against Asian-American applicants.
Justice Department attorneys have appealed that ruling and oral arguments in the case are scheduled for next month.
• Jeff Mordock can be reached at jmordock@washingtontimes.com.
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