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‘The Academy sets specific racial goals for each incoming class,’ according to the complaint

Students for Fair Admissions has sued to block a U.S. military academy’s race-influenced admissions policies following the Supreme Court case banning affirmative action in universities.

SFFA “filed a lawsuit challenging the use of race and ethnicity as admissions factors” at the United States Military Academy at West Point, according to a news release. The group seeks an outcome similar to that of its successful challenges to Harvard and the University of North Carolina’s affirmative action policies.

SFFA declined to comment on the litigation, informing The College Fix in an email that “the briefs in the case will address” The Fix’s questions. West Point also declined to comment.

In the complaint, filed Sept. 19 with the U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York, SFFA challenged West Point’s policy of “racial balancing,” whereby the academy sets “‘desired percentages . . . of blacks, Hispanics, and other minorities’ for each incoming class.”

“The Academy sets specific racial goals for each incoming class and adjusts them year over year to balance the racial demographics of each class with the racial demographics of the general population and enlisted corps,” the complaint stated.

SFFA argued West Point’s race-conscious admissions policy violates the Fifth Amendment, which “contains an equal-protection principle that binds the federal government and is no less strict than the Equal Protection Clause that [only] binds the States” and was the basis for SFFA’s successful challenge to UNC’s affirmative action policy, according to the complaint.

West Point asserted a “well-functioning Army in a pluralistic society” should reflect the racial composition of that society, the complaint stated. Without this, “unit cohesion” will suffer as “racial strife within units” flourishes, the military academy argued.

SFFA disputed this contention, arguing racial conflict in the Army is historically rare.

“In fact, ‘racial animosity had been negligible within the U.S. armed forces’ prior to 1967, and it has been virtually nonexistent post-Vietnam,” according to the complaint, citing a 2001 article in The Guardian by journalist James Maycock and a 2021 article posted to the U.S. Air Force website.

The factors causing this racial conflict, according to SFFA, were unrelated to colorblind policies and instead derived from “a changing social environment, a controversial war, and new conscription strategies” no longer present.

West Point also justified its diversity policies as necessary to maintain the trust of the public.

Challenging this assumption, SFFA pointed to a Ronald Reagan Institute survey showing military leaders’ over-emphasis on social justice issues and political correctness may be making the military less effective.

Half of those surveyed said that“so-called ‘woke’ practices undermining military effectiveness have decreased their confidence” in the military, according to the 2022 survey.

The Fix reached out by email or contact form on September 25 to West Point and its counsel, Secretary of the Army Christine Wormuth, the U.S. Department of Defense, and the U.S. Attorney General’s office. The Department of Defense declined to comment on ongoing litigation. No others replied.

The Fix reported Sept. 1 that SFFA was turning its attention to American military academies exempted from the affirmative action ban.

The group had been collecting experiences of students who applied to the Air Force, Army and Navy military academies.

“WestPointNotFair.org is an undertaking by Students for Fair Admissions (SFFA), a membership group formed in 2014 to challenge the use of racial classifications and preferences in college admissions,” according to the site.

The group stated it is “committed to ending [affirmative action] at America’s military service academies.”

The Supreme Court’s affirmative action ruling in Students for Fair Admissions Inc. v. President and Fellows of Harvard College included an exemption for military academies.

“The United States as amicus curiae contends that race-based admissions programs further compelling interests at our Nation’s military academies,” Chief Justice John Roberts wrote in a footnote. “No military academy is a party to these cases, however, and none of the courts below addressed the propriety of race-based admissions systems in that context.”

“This opinion also does not address the issue, in light of the potentially distinct interests that military academies may present,” the footnote continued.

The Biden administration argued in a friend-of-the-court brief for keeping affirmative action on the grounds that the military “depends on a well-qualified and diverse officer corps that is prepared to lead a diverse fighting force.”

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