Asians in a world without affirmative action

How race and identity are shaping politics, policy and power.

Jun 30, 2023 View in browser   By Brakkton Booker With help from Ella Creamer, Rishika Dugyala, Jesse Naranjo and Teresa Wiltz Protesters converged outside the Supreme Court on June 29, 2023, after the court struck down affirmative action in college admissions. | Jose Luis Magana/AP Photo What up, Recast family! Affirmative action in college admissions is now history. President Joe Biden lashes out saying, “This is not a normal court.” Former President Donald Trump says, “This is a great day for America.” And Michelle Obama says,v“My heart breaks for any young person out there who’s wondering what their future holds.”   The Supreme Court — just days before the nation celebrates its independence — delivered an explosive ruling that hinges on race and fans America’s ideological divisions. In a historic 6-3 ruling, the high court sent pyrotechnics through the political world by striking down race-conscious admissions policies for the nation's colleges and universities, ending some 40 years of precedent that affirmative action proponents argue is needed to achieve America’s goal of becoming a more perfect union. For many in the Asian American and Pacific Islander community, the ruling is complicated. Some express trepidation that their community — already subject to increased violence and harassment with the Covid-19 pandemic — will be scapegoats for the fall of the policy. Others are celebrating it, pointing to the AAPI plaintiffs who blame affirmative action policies as the reason why they weren’t admitted to elite universities.   Was The Recast forwarded to you by a friend? Don't forget to subscribe to the newsletter here. Every week, we interview influential characters shaking up politics. Let us know whom we should profile next. Email therecast@politico.com.   We checked in with prominent figures, divided themselves over the decision, about how the court’s landmark decision will impact Asian Americans, the future of education and politics. John Yoo believes that Asian American students were most harmed by the race-conscious policies. | Melissa Golden/Getty Images John Yoo, a former deputy assistant attorney general at the Justice Department during the George W. Bush administration, disagrees with race-conscious admissions. “It has had disastrous consequences on not just the court, but the country,” Yoo, who now teaches law at the University of Berkeley, California, tells The Recast. He says the affirmative action decision is on par with last year’s generation-defining Dobbs decision that ended nearly a half century of the constitutional right to abortion, but says yesterday’s ruling likely will not be as much of a galvanizing force in next year’s elections. “I don't think it'll spark the same kind of political reaction because in the case of affirmative action, a majority of American people … don't want race used by the government for anything, not just admissions to colleges and universities.” Yoo believes — as does the organization that spearheaded the challenge to Harvard’s and the University of North Carolina’s admission practices, Students for Fair Admissions — that Asian American students were most harmed by the race-conscious policies. And he says the Supreme Court’s ruling (though it is a whopping 237 pages long) was actually quite simple: “We allowed an exception … to colleges and universities to use race when they make decisions. That's an anomaly every time we've done it. It's been a mistake.” Affirmative action advocates rally outside the Supreme Court on Oct. 31, 2022. | Francis Chung/POLITICO But critics blast the majority opinion as an overly simplistic interpretation of law. One point of contention: In the majority opinion, Chief Justice John Roberts writes, “Eliminating racial discrimination means eliminating all of it,” referring to the provisions outlined in the 1860s-era 14th Amendment. Verna Williams, the CEO of Equal Justice Works, says Roberts is ignoring why the framers implemented the 14th Amendment in the first place. “I mean, [the framers] would have to be completely blind and absolutely naive to think that just putting those words in the Constitution would reverse or address hundreds of years of slavery,” Williams tells The Recast. A Harvard Law School grad who co-founded the Nathaniel R. Jones Center for Race, Gender, and Social Justice, Williams adds that Roberts’ opinion subscribes to the idea of “formal equality.” It’s a concept that ignores differences among individuals and believes treating everyone the same means they’ll be subjected to the same outcomes. That, she says, reinforces stereotypes: It also leads to an unspoken, but clearly understood, whataboutism among minority races, she said: “See, they can make it. And if Asians can make it, what’s the matter with the rest of you people of color?” The ruling is fueling fears that Black and Latino enrollment at elite colleges and universities will drastically drop even further — and that it will have reverberations beyond race-based college admissions. “Honestly, this is the type of stuff that, while the case is posed at admissions, it can be read broadly enough to go into other aspects of university life,” says Jeff Chang, a journalist and author of “We Gon’ Be Alright: Notes on Resegregation.”  This could include bringing lawsuits against minority-targeted scholarships, college-based affinity group housing, and even Black, Asian and Latino fraternities and sororities. The gutting of affirmative action in college admissions, Chang argues, gives those who want to use the equal protection clause “a free invitation to say anything that regards race is up for grabs.” The Supreme Court on Thursday struck down affirmative action in college admissions. | Mariam Zuhaib/AP Photo/ There are larger existential questions, he says, that AAPI folks grappling with the fall of affirmative action should be asking. "So the larger question is, where does this end for Asian Americans? The question becomes, OK, how much is enough, y'all? Is it ethically right for Asian Americans to be taking up 80 percent of the seats at a public magnet school? Or should Asian Americans be at the forefront of a movement for better equal education opportunity for all?" A Pew Research Center survey earlier this month found that while roughly half of Asian American respondents say affirmative action is a good policy, some three-quarters also note that colleges and universities should not use race and ethnicity when determining admissions. Others are concerned about the racial blowback: that the fall of affirmative action is because of Asian elites. “This plays into this idea that Asian Americans are victims, because we can get into Harvard,” says Diana Hwang, founder of the Asian American Women's Political Initiative, which advocates for Asian American and Pacific Islander women to seek a career in politics. Hwang says the affirmative action in college admissions cases underscores an “evil brilliance” of how many Asian Americans were centered in the case, brought by Edward Blum, the affirmative action adversary who leads SFFA and wakes up at 4:30 a.m. on most mornings to scour the internet looking for people to file suits against. “At the end of the day, the real problem is that we're people of color when you want us to be and not people of color when you don’t.” The challenges to the affirmative action programs at Harvard and UNC are the seventh and eighth cases initiated by conservative activist Edward Blum. | Francis Chung/POLITICO Blum recruited Abigail Fisher, the lead plaintiff for the Fisher v. University of Texas case. Fisher, as you may recall, is a white woman who claimed racial preferences denied her admission to the University of Texas at Austin. In a 4-3 decision, the court ruled the school did not violate the equal protection clause. Seven years later, with the court’s makeup decidedly more conservative, Blum heralded yesterday's decision. The ruling, he said in a statement, “marks the beginning of the restoration of the colorblind legal covenant that binds together our multi-racial, multi-ethnic nation.” ◆◆◆ We are all working to process what it now means to be in a post-affirmative action in college admissions America. So let’s get you caught up with some essential reading — and of course, some pop culture recs later down. POLITICO’s Bianca Quilantan breaks down how the ruling may change admissions processes for colleges and universities — and outlines some potential legal battles to come. Ketanji Brown Jackson testifies during her confirmation hearing in March 2022. | Drew Angerer/Getty Images Our senior legal affairs reporter Josh Gerstein highlights the “acrimony in the back-and-forth between” the court’s Black justices: Clarence Thomas in his concurring opinion and Ketanji Brown Jackson in her dissent. Could corporate diversity be the next legal battleground? POLITICO’s Nick Niedzwiadek explores. Noted legal scholar Kimberlé Crenshaw was on the legal team that supported Anita Hill during Thomas’ confirmation hearing more than 30 years ago. “For Black Americans and their allies,” she writes in POLITICO Magazine, “Thomas’ role in weakening the painstakingly-built legal apparatus to advance civil rights is particularly tragic.” In The Guardian today: “‘A cautionary tale’: colleges in states with affirmative action bans report racial disparities.” Could this ruling mean the culture wars are nearing their end? Vox goes in search of answers. NBC talks with students struggling to make sense of the ruling and feeling their cultural identity doesn’t matter. In her stunning memoir “Owner of a Lonely Heart,” Beth Nguyen reflects on her relationship with her mother, who remained in Vietnam when Nguyen moved to America as a refugee. In new AppleTV+ series “Hijack,” Idris Elba plays a corporate negotiator who tries to put his professional skills to good use when his flight from Dubai to London gets taken over. Olivia Rodrigo returns with some pointed lyrics for the gothic track “Vampire,” accompanied by a creepy MV in which the show goes very wrong. Joyner Lucas’ characteristic storytelling is on point in the rapper’s latest release, “Broski,” chronicling how artists’ friends change when fame and money come on the scene. TikTok of the Day: Banger alert   Follow us on Twitter Brakkton Booker @brakktonbooker Rishika Dugyala @rishikadugyala Teresa Wiltz @teresawiltz Jesse Naranjo @jesselnaranjo   Follow us

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