CNN chief legal analyst Laura Coates responded to the Supreme Court's Thursday ruling that declared affirmative action unconstitutional on CNN News Central by warning that the effects won’t be limited to Harvard or the University of North Carolina. No, getting rid of affirmative action will make the U.S. military a less effective warfighting force.
Before tossing the conversation to Coates, host Sara Sidner lamented, “I think there is already precedent here because California and Michigan both had basically abolished the affirmative action, it could not be used as a factor or the deciding factor in admissions and they’ve all seen their diversity numbers drop.”
Sidner then asked “This has, I think, been held for 40 years that affirmative action has been in place, now they have upended that. Stare decisis, as you attorneys call it, it’s no longer in this case, and what do you make of this decision, and what it means to those going to college now and to the universities themselves?”
A solemn Coates responded that “Well, I don't think that we can even overstate the role that race has played in our society, as a country and it also is a very big part of one's identity and part of the college admissions process is the practice of a student, a potential applicant, detailing why they believe their identity and being ought to be an additive addition to a particular school.”
After lamenting that colleges will no longer be able to consider race in their admissions process, Coates worried about the downstream effects, “I know that we are short on time, but the monumental consequence of the decision cannot be overstated, everyone from Apple to IKEA to Starbucks joined in on briefs to talk about ‘racial diversity improving decision making by increasing creativity and communication and accuracy,’ some of the largest law firms in our country talked about the private bar and the legal profession benefitting from a diverse pool to recruit.”
Worrying about the racial demographics of IKEA employees is one bad enough, but Coates wasn’t done, “admirals, a group of them, and generals also told the Court that, quote, ‘diversity in the halls of academia directly affects performance of theatres in war.’”
Summing it all up, Coates declared, “And those who believe that the confines of action and the decision is going to be here only in the halls of Harvard or perhaps the University of North Carolina, you have the amicus briefs about the impact more broadly, and a potential domino impact of this decision.”
Earlier on CNN, before the ruling was announced, national politics reporter for the New York Times Astead Herndon warned that previous rulings favoring liberal sensibilities on the Alabama and North Carolina cases won’t matter if the Court overturns affirmative action or President Biden’s student loan forgiveness program, “those can completely undo or upend that kind of legitimacy or kind of confidence question in the court even as we have had these decisions that may have gone different than folks expected the last couple of weeks.”
Saying the quiet part out loud: legitimacy, for the media, is whether or not the Court aligns with the left.
Here is a transcript for the June 29 show:
CNN News Central
6/29/2023
10:11 AM ET
SARA SIDNER: And I think there is already precedent here because California and Michigan both had basically abolished the affirmative action, it could not be used as a factor or the deciding factor in admissions and they’ve all seen their diversity numbers drop—
ELIE HONIG: Yeah.
SIDNER: -- since then. I’m going to go to Laura Coates, quickly, on that—on this. This has, I think, been held for 40 years that affirmative action has been in place, now they have upended that. Stare decisis, as you attorneys call it, it’s no longer in this case, and what do you make of this decision, and what it means to those going to college now and to the universities themselves?
LAURA COATES: Well, I don't think that we can even overstate the role that race has played in our society, as a country and it also is a very big part of one's identity and part of the college admissions process is the practice of a student, a potential applicant, detailing why they believe their identity and being ought to be an additive addition to a particular school.
Now, it’ll be very hard for an admissions process and admissions office to delineate between how a student views themselves and their identity and what can now be considered in practice. An example that came up during the Supreme Court oral arguments is the idea, well, what about a student who is writing about their personal identity as it relates to their race.
Is the admissions office to look at that essay, burn it --
SIDNER: Of course.
COATES: --throw it out, and say “I cannot see this here, because it deals with race” and I want to just read you a quick notion here, I know that we are short on time, but the monumental consequence of the decision cannot be overstated, everyone from Apple to IKEA to Starbucks joined in on briefs to talk about “racial diversity improving decision making by increasing creativity and communication and accuracy,” some of the largest law firms in our country talked about the private bar and the legal profession benefitting from a diverse pool to recruit, and admirals, a group of them, and generals also told the Court that, quote, “diversity in the halls of academia directly affects performance of theatres in war.”
And those who believe that the confines of action and the decision is going to be here only in the halls of Harvard or perhaps the University of North Carolina, you have the amicus briefs about the impact more broadly, and a potential domino impact of this decision.
