Asian Professor Alleges SMU Relabeled Him ‘White,’ Discriminated Against Him

Sean Wang, an assistant professor of accounting at the Edwin L. Cox School of Business at Southern Methodist University (SMU), filed suit against the university for unlawful discrimination and retaliation in November 2025.

News of the lawsuit broke days ago, first reported by journalist Chris Brunet.

Wang, who is Chinese-American, alleges SMU’s Accounting Department “has had a systematic pattern of discrimination in tenure decision” since the arrival of Indian-origin professor Hemang Desai.

{snip}

The complaint continues, claiming Wang was recorded in SMU’s human resources and equal employment opportunity records as “White.”

“This misclassification was not a typographical error, i.e. clicking the wrong box for race, as ‘white’ was typed into the form, and Dr. Wang’s surname (Wang) and multiple face-to-face meetings made his ethnicity obvious.”

The complaint alleges that the misclassification created “false records that removed recognition of his minority status from official records.”

The implication here is that, by misclassifying Wang as white, SMU might more easily discriminate against him. If true, this would seem evidence of extreme anti-white bias at SMU.

{snip}