Students for Fair Admissions (SFFA), a group founded by
anti-affirmative action activist Edward Blum, in a petition
asked the court to fast-track the UNC case and take it alongside
a challenge to Harvard's admissions policies.
"If the Supreme Court decides, as it should, to reconsider
racial preferences in college admissions, it should consider
that question in the context of both a private school and a
public school," Blum said in a statement.
Harvard declined to comment. UNC did not respond to requests for
comment. Both call their admissions practices lawful.
SFFA was already challenging an appellate court's rejection of
its claims that Harvard's policies discriminate against Asian
Americans, giving the U.S. Supreme Court's 6-3 conservative
majority a chance to end affirmative action on campuses.
But last month a judge rejected SFFA's allegations in a case
filed in 2014 that said UNC's consideration of race in its
undergraduate admissions process discriminated against white and
Asian American applicants.
SFFA said the justices should take the UNC case with the Harvard
one without going to an appellate court.
The court in June asked the administration of U.S. President Joe
Biden to weigh in on whether it should hear the Harvard case. It
has not yet.
SFFA said that the U.S. Supreme Court nearly two decades ago did
something similar when it took up two affirmative action cases
involving the University of Michigan and bypassed an appellate
court with one of them.
The justices ultimately in 2003 preserved affirmative action on
campuses in a ruling SFFA wants overturned.
Harvard argues Title VI of the Civil Rights Act forbids federal
funding recipients from using race in admissions. The UNC case
contends that, for public schools, the U.S. Constitution's 14th
Amendment compels the same conclusion.
(Reporting by Nate Raymond in Boston; editing by Grant McCool)
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