Today, a unanimous Supreme Court drove yet another peg in the coffin of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI). Ruling in Ames v. Ohio, the Court found that reverse discrimination claims, that is, discrimination against members of majority groups, must be granted equal treatment under Title VII legislation. Discrimination on the basis of immutable characteristics is illegal. Black, white, and Hispanic Americans; men and women; and all Heritage Americans are entitled to the full protection of the law. Today’s decision makes it much easier for Americans who were denied jobs on the basis of DEI to find justice in court.
By rejecting the “background circumstances” doctrine, the Court opens the way for true equality in hiring. As the great Justice Clarence Thomas notes in his concurrence, “today’s decision obviates the need for courts to engage in the ‘sordid business’ of ‘divvying us up by race’ or any other protected trait.” This decision follows Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard, which banned race-based college admissions that illegally discriminated against white and Asian Americans, among other groups. It was heartening, as well, to see Justice Neil Gorsuch join Justice Thomas’s concurrence, which emphatically rejected “judge-made doctrines” that have no basis in law.
The New York Young Republican Club welcomes today’s decision by a unanimous Supreme Court and hails the end of DEI in employment. Reverse discrimination, like all other forms of discrimination, is a “sordid business” with no basis in U.S. law. That Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson wrote the Court’s unanimous opinion demonstrates that even the American left realizes that DEI has gone too far. America is a free country for all individuals; the opportunity to share in the American Dream is open to all who accept the uniquely American way of life.