Posted on November 5, 2015

More than 160 Asian-American Groups File Briefs in Support of Affirmative Action

Emil Guillermo, NBC News, November 3, 2015

More than 160 Asian American and Pacific Islander groups have filed amicus briefs calling for the U.S. Supreme Court to uphold affirmative action policies at the University of Texas at Austin.

Asian Americans Advancing Justice (AAAJ), the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund (AALDEF), and the National Asian Pacific American Bar Association (NAPABA) filed the briefs Monday, representing more than 160 groups and 53 individuals.

“Such broad support for race conscious admissions policies sends a clear message that AAPIs overwhelmingly support these policies and will not be used as a racial wedge to disenfranchise other communities of color,” Laboni Hoq, litigation director at Advancing Justice–Los Angeles, said in a press release.

The filings are in anticipation of the Supreme Court’s second review of Fisher v. University of Texas. Abigail Fisher, a Caucasian student, was rejected when she applied to UT-Austin. {snip}

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Fisher’s case relied heavily on that claim that Asian Americans were discriminated against by the admissions policy at UT-Austin, but in its brief, AALDEF argued that nothing on the record showed that the admissions process at UT disadvantaged or discriminated against Asian Americans.

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AALDEF’s brief argued that the use of race in a holistic review of applicants is constitutional, and that nothing in UT’s policies indicate “any cap, quota, bias, or other kind of negative action, formal or informal affecting Asian Americans or any other group.”

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The Supreme Court announced this summer it would hear the case for a second time. Oral arguments are scheduled for Dec. 9.