Title VI of the Civil Rights Act bans discrimination based on race, color, and national origin. The University of Southern California and Loyola Marymount University violated that ban by providing a Hispanic-only program with staff and housing for participants. The Equal Protection Project has filed a civil-rights complaint against the program with the Education Department’s Office for Civil Rights.
It did so because the program is “expressly limited to students who identify as being of Hispanic heritage.” “USC and LMU participation” in the Young Leadership Institute program thus “violates Title VI”, notes the complaint, filed eight days ago. It adds that “While the institute is run by an outside nonprofit, USC and LMU support it by providing on-campus housing and other facilities, furnishing speakers and university personnel, and making classroom and meeting space available. Accordingly, USC and LMU are legally liable for the discrimination that takes place on their campuses with their support.”
The Young Leadership Institute program is “a free, college empowerment program for high-achieving Latino high school juniors.” But it is not open to non-Latino high school juniors.
William Jacobson, president of the Equal Protection Project, said the program amounts to “open discrimination, they don’t try to hide it. The program says it’s only open to students who identify as Hispanic, only those students can participate in these events on campus and by definition, if those are the only students who can participate, those are the only ones who can receive the benefit of temporary housing.”
It is worth noting that the program does not violate the Constitution or the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment. That is because the Constitution only regulates state universities, not private universities such as the University of Southern California and Loyola Marymount University. They are subject to federal civil rights laws such as 42 U.S.C. 1981 — which bans discrimination based on race and alienage in contracts — and Title VI of the Civil Rights Act — which bans discrimination based on race or national origin in educational institutions that receive federal funds. But not the Constitution.
Programs can constitute racial discrimination even if they are for a minority group, rather than whites. A scholarship for blacks was struck down as illegal racial discrimination in Podberesky v. Kirwan (1994), for example.
And the Supreme Court ruled in 2023 that minorities generally cannot be given a preference in college admissions, even to promote “diversity” or affirmative action. Such preferences are considered racial discrimination in violation of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act and 42 U.S.C. 1981.
