A federal civil rights complaint against the University of South Carolina alleges discrimination on the basis of race in official University scholarships.
The Equal Protection Project (EPP) filed the complaint Thursday morning to the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights, alleging that scholarships reserved for minorities or provided preferentially on the basis of race violate the law.
“That racially discriminatory scholarships exist at a major public university in a deeply ‘red’ state is shocking and reflects how Critical Race Theory and its offshoots like Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion, are deeply embedded in the campus culture,” William A. Jacobson, founder of the EPP and EqualProtect.org, told Breitbart News. “It is time for higher education everywhere to focus on the inherent worth and dignity of every student rather than categorizing students based on identity groups.”
Five scholarships offered by the university “violate Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (‘Title VI’) and its implementing regulations by discriminating against students based on their race, color, and/or national origin,” EPP’s lawsuit reads. “Because USC is a public university, these discriminatory scholarships also violate the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.”
Requirements for those scholarships include being an “underrepresented minority,” “minority freshman,” and “American or International minority.”
“Creating educational opportunities based on race, color, or national origin violates Title VI of the Civil Rights Act, as well as South Carolina law,” Jacobsen said. “Such race-based scholarships also violate USC’s own non-discrimination policies. We are asking USC to live up to the law and its own rules, and remove the discriminatory eligibility barriers it has erected.”
OCR Complaint – University of South Carolina
A spokesman for the university did not respond to a request for comment.
The lawsuit’s filing coincides with a heated debate in the South Carolina statehouse over the propriety of DEI in higher education and a bill that has proposed the banning of the practice. Yet South Carolina’s largest public university continues the discriminatory and unlawful policies, EPP alleges.
Motives don’t justify unconstitutional discrimination, the lawsuit argues.
“Racial and ethnic discrimination are wrong and unlawful no matter which race or ethnicity is targeted or benefits. All applicants are entitled to equal treatment without regard to race, color, or national origin,” Jacobsen said. “The Equal Protection Project calls on the senior administration of USC to make sure nondiscrimination standards are upheld throughout the institution.”
“USC should know better than to run scholarships that exclude students based on race, color, or national origin,” he continued. “Where were the administrators and staff whose jobs supposedly are devoted to preventing discrimination? Why was there no intervention to uphold the legally required equal access to education?”
The lawsuit also coincides with a broader discussion of race-based discrimination at college campuses.
In February, the Department of Education opened investigations into 45 universities over alleged race-based preferences and policies, Breitbart News’s Katherine Hamilton reported.
The guidance issued by the department in conjunction with those investigations “reiterates and makes crystal clear what has always been the law, that ‘under any banner, discrimination on the basis of race, color, or national origin is, has been, and will continue to be illegal,'” Jacobsen told Breitbart News. “It does not matter what schools call it – ‘anti-racism’ or ‘diversity, equity, and inclusion,’ or something else – what matters is that no measure of discrimination based on race, color, or national origin is permitted.”
Jacobsen added:
The OCR Civil Rights Guidance also confirms what has been clear, that the equal protection and civil rights rulings of the Supreme Court in the Students for Fair Admissions case extend beyond the narrow context of university admissions and affirmative action. The lesson of SFFA is that diversity is not a sufficiently compelling state interest to justify racial discrimination. At its core SFFA is an equal protection clause and Civil Rights Act ruling, and the legal holdings extend wherever those legal protections reach, including scholarships and other educational opportunities.
EPP, a non-profit seeking to ensure equal protection under the law and non-discrimination by the government, has emerged as a leader in the fight for fairness and protection of key constitutional rights not just on college campuses, but also in K-12 schools throughout the nation.
“At EPP we have filed almost 100 cases challenging over 300 discriminatory scholarships and programs,” he said. “In no case are we aware of a school claiming it was free to discriminate on the basis of race, color, or national origin, so why does it keep happening? Unfortunately, there is a culture on many campuses that excuses some forms of racial discrimination, and that needs to stop.”
Bradley Jaye is Deputy Political Editor for Breitbart News. Follow him on X/Twitter and Instagram @BradleyAJaye
