Former President Donald Trump commented on the Supreme Court of the United States' (SCOTUS) Thursday ruling finding the practice of affirmative action unconstitutional.
SCOTUS ruled universities and colleges cannot weigh an applicant’s race during the admissions process saying the practice was a violation of the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment.
“We have never permitted admissions programs to work in that way, and we will not do so today,” the Court stated with a majority of justices finding affirmative action policies "unavoidably employ race in a negative manner, involve racial stereotyping, and lack meaningful end points."
Trump responded to SCOTUS' ruling saying it was a "great day for America."
"People with extraordinary ability and everything else necessary for success, including future greatness for our country, are finally being rewarded," he wrote. "This is the ruling everyone was waiting and hoping for and the result was amazing."
"It will also keep us competitive with the rest of the world," Trump continued. "Our greatest minds must be cherished and that's what this wonderful day has brought."
"We're going back to all merit-based—and that's the way it should be!"
Chief Justice Roberts wrote the majority opinion determining the University of North Carolina (UNC) and Harvard's affirmative action practices "lack sufficiently focused and measurable objectives warranting the use of race," though said the majority opinion wouldn't prohibit universities from considering an applicant’s discussion of how race affected their experience through discrimination, inspiration, or otherwise.
"Despite the dissent’s assertion to the contrary, universities may not simply establish through application essays or other means the regime we hold unlawful today," Roberts continued, adding students must be treated based on their experiences as an individual rather than based on their race. "Many universities have for too long done just the opposite."
"In doing so, they have concluded, wrongly, that the touchstone of an individual’s identity is not challenges bested, skills built, or lessons learned but the color of their skin," he wrote. "Our constitutional history does not tolerate that choice.”
Justice Clarance Thomas wrote a concurring opinion saying it was unclear how colleges and universities employing affirmative action programs based on racial diversity "uniquely and independently" benefitted goals of the educational institutions, noting Harvard "blinded" itself to other forms of applicant diversity including religion.
"Two white students, one from rural Appalachia and one from a wealthy San Francisco suburb, may well have more diverse outlooks on this metric than two students from Manhattan’s Upper East Side attending its most elite schools, one of whom is white and other of whom is black," Thomas wrote. "If Harvard cannot even explain the link between racial diversity and education, then surely its interest in racial diversity cannot be compelling enough to overcome the constitutional limits on race consciousness. UNC fares no better."
“While I am painfully aware of the social and economic ravages which have befallen my race and all who suffer discrimination, I hold out enduring hope that this country will live up to its principles so clearly enunciated in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States: that all men are created equal, are equal citizens, and must be treated equally before the law," Thomas concluded.
