Federal officials announced findings on Wednesday alleging that the University of California, Berkeley School of Law systematically discriminated against Asian and white applicants during its admissions process.
The joint investigation, conducted by the U.S. Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division and the U.S. Department of Education, concluded that the law school’s practices violate Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2023 ruling in Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard (SFFA), which outlawed race-conscious admissions in higher education.
According to federal investigators, Berkeley Law continued to use race, targeted essay prompts, and other strategies after the 2023 high court ruling to meet institutional diversity goals. The findings state that the school asked applicants to disclose their racial identities on applications to group admitted students by their “primary identity” in classrooms, effectively separating students by race…