Press Releases

Today, Congressional Black Caucus Chairman Steven Horsford (NV-04) and members of the Congressional Black Caucus issued the following statement regarding the Supreme Court’s decision in Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard and UNC.

“Since 1978, the Supreme Court has held that race-based admissions policies in colleges and universities can be administered in keeping with the Title VI of the Civil Rights Act and the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Precedents set decades ago in the landmark Bakke decision have given students – regardless of their race or ethnicity – a better chance at equal admissions to our nation's top schools, and our country has been made better for it. By delivering a decision on affirmative action so radical as to deny young people seeking an education equal opportunity in our education system, the Supreme Court has thrown into question its own legitimacy. 

“Unfortunately, we have seen backlash to progress many times throughout our nation’s history. During Reconstruction, we had a mere 12 years of Black achievement in policy, politics, the arts and sciences, and education that were followed by 70 years of state-sanctioned Jim Crow. We didn't stop fighting for equality then and we won’t stop now because too much is at stake to allow extremists to turn back the clock on progress. 

“The Congressional Black Caucus is proud to stand alongside our colleagues of the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus (CAPAC) and the Congressional Hispanic Caucus (CHC) to fight for equal opportunity in admissions and to push back strongly against attempts to use this as a cultural wedge issue to pit communities of color against one another because our nation's diversity is our greatest strength.”