STATEMENTS ON U.S. SUPREME COURT'S AFFIRMATIVE ACTION RULING

By StyleMagazine.com - Newswire

Today's decision is even more concerning given the recent actions in Texas to outlaw Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion at public universities under Senate Bill 17. Even with these needed DEI initiatives, the racial gap in higher education, as Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson said in her dissent, is "indisputable."

– Mayor Sylvester Turner

“Today, the United States Supreme Court has willfully ignored centuries of slavery and invidious racial discrimination in its decision to invalidate the use of race in admitting university students. The Supreme Court has made the primary method of upward mobility in this country even more difficult to access for students of color. Educated young people of color advancing in our society and economy is a goal that people of good will should wholeheartedly support. Regrettably, this is a step backward for our country and a shameful moment in our history.”

– Congressman Al Green

“Today, the U.S. Supreme Court rendered its decisions on two significant cases, Students for Fair Admissions v. University of

North Carolina and Students for Fair Admissions Inc. v. President & Fellows of Harvard College, which challenged affirmative action in higher education. Unfortunately, the Court's ruling struck down the use of affirmative action in admissions at Harvard and the University of North Carolina, contradicting decades of precedent. This decision is deeply troubling and undermines the progress we have made in advancing racial equity and diversity in higher education.” – Ron Reynolds

“My experience as a Black lawyer has put me in spaces where almost no one looked like me or had similar life experiences. This Supreme Court decision eliminates a key program that was working to help ensure that those rooms look different when Black kids like my son head to college.” -

Harris County Attorney Christian D. Menefee

"Today's Supreme Court decision to overturn affirmative action in college admissions is a profound setback for our nation and the pursuit of equality and justice. I am the product of affirmative action. I had the opportunity to receive a top-tier education, but the rest was up to me. That same opportunity has now been stolen from millions of young people from marginalized communities who still grapple with the effects of systemic racism. This is yet another reminder that advances and victories will not last if we don’t sustain the fight. The arc of the moral universe doesn’t bend on its own. It’s taken constant struggle and sacrifice to make advances—and it will take the same to sustain those advances and push forward. This setback will not deter us from pursuing a more just and equitable future for all." –

Commissioner Rodney Ellis

Today’s Anti-Affirmative Action opinion issued by the U.S Supreme Court is a dark victory for extremists. A departure from the values embodied in our Declaration of Independence and Constitution which supported the executive orders of President Kennedy in March 1961 and President Johnson in September 1965. This ruling declares that all men and women are not created equal and advances the agenda of supremacist ideology.

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