CA Affirmative Action Gets A 'No' As Prop 16 Fails

LOS ANGELES, CA — Voters rejected Proposition 16 Tuesday, ensuring that affirmative action won't be allowed in California's college admissions nor in government hiring.

Proposition 16, the effort to reverse the state's decades-old ban on affirmative action has failed. The Associated Press made the call Wednesday morning. With 72 percent of precincts reporting, enough voters had rejected the measure to decide the race. As of 10 a.m. Wednesday, 6,409,161 voters or 56.1 percent of voters had rejected the measure compared to 5,020,581 or 43.9 percent of the voters who favored it.

Nearly a quarter of a century after California voters enshrined a ban on affirmative action in the state Constitution, Proposition 16 sought to repeal it amid a national reckoning with racism.

Supporters raised $31 million and include chambers of commerce, celebrities, tech companies and Democratic leaders. They say affirmative action programs are critical to undoing generations of systemic racism and sexism that holds back people of color and women.

In contrast, opponents have raised $1.6 million, fueled by smaller donations from a grassroots network that includes Chinese immigrants worried that public universities will bypass Asian American applicants with higher scores and grades in favor of lower-scoring African American and Latino students. They say discrimination should stay illegal.

Opponents celebrated via Zoom Tuesday, cheering their David versus Goliath fight as results rolled in. The measure was passing in liberal San Francisco Bay Area counties and in Los Angeles County, but failing in other large Southern California counties.

Ward Connerly, the African American businessman who led the 1996 campaign to end affirmative action and to prohibit the state from granting preferences or discriminating against a person due to race or gender, said the campaign was “heartened” by the results.

“The people are saying we want to be treated as equals,” said Connerly, 81.

Proponents did not respond to requests for comment, but they acknowledged before Election Day that the race would be tight. They said they did not have enough time to campaign on what they say was a complicated issue.

Angel Chavez, 45, a San Diego tattoo artist and supporter of President Donald Trump, said Tuesday he voted against the affirmative action measure.

“I’m Mexican. Yet, I’ve never felt racism,” he said. “If I don’t get a job, it’s because somebody was more qualified.”

A lot has changed since 1996 when voters passed Proposition 209, making it illegal for public institutions to discriminate against or grant preferential treatment based on an applicant’s race, sex, color, ethnicity, or national origin. Back then, California had a Republican governor and affirmative action was a controversial topic. Since then, states across the nation have adopted affirmative action, and California has swung leftward.

Proponents of Proposition 16 believed the widespread demonstrations calling for social justice in the wake of George Floyd’s death signal readiness for policies that seek to redress inequality. They contend affirmative action is one of the most effective ways to provide opportunities to underrepresented groups that have been historically discriminated against.

Opponents of the measure contend affirmative action is misguided, claiming it uses one form of discrimination to combat another.

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"I have experienced racial discrimination, so I know what that’s like,” State Senator Ling Ling Chang said in a written statement. “But the answer to racial discrimination is not more discrimination which is what this bill proposes. The answer is to strengthen our institutions by improving our education system so all students have access to a quality education, and give opportunities to those who are economically disadvantaged.”

Richard D. Kahlenberg, of the Century Foundation in Washington, said affirmative action protections are a shortcut that prompts universities to grant preferential treatment to upper and middle class minorities rather than Latinos and Blacks, who are economically disadvantaged.

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"Because it is much cheaper to provide racial preferences to upper middle class Latino and African American students than it is to do the hard work of recruiting economically disadvantaged and working-class Latino and African American students, I fear that many of these progressive reforms could be diluted if 209 is repealed," Kahlenberg told EdSource.

Proposition 16 struggled in the polls leading up to election day despite a massive list of prominent elected officials, school boards, unions, nonprofits and civil rights groups supporting it. According to the Public Policy Institute of California, just 31 percent of likely voters surveyed support the measure.

“I would think that Prop. 16 would generate more support," Mark Baldassare, CEO of the Public Policy Institute of California, told KQED . "And at this point, two-thirds of the voters are either saying they don't know or they would vote against it. And that's including Democrats.”

That may be because it’s confusing, said Ana Lopez, an analyst at Latino Decisions, which conducts Latino political opinion research.

It’s essentially a repeal of a repeal, she said. And confusingly, it repeals Proposition 209, which “generally prohibits state and local governments from discriminating against, or granting preferential treatment to, individuals or groups on the basis of race, sex, color, ethnicity, or national origin in the operation of public employment, education, or contracting.”

Lopez said she’s spoken with Latino voters who think Prop 20 aimed to hurt them by repealing the state’s protection against racial discrimination. Others think the measure actually eliminates affirmative action, she said.

California is one of only nine states that outlaws affirmative action, and there is a lot of confusion about what it does, according to Lopez.

“There are also misconceptions that there will be quotas in place,” she said. “There will be no quotas. It really just allows more holistic reviews of individuals, acknowledging and seeing them for who they are... It is taking away the barriers of discrimination in place.”

In fact, the Supreme Court outlawed racial quota systems at public institutions decades ago.

According to Lopez, Proposition 209 caused University of California admission rates among Blacks and Latinos to plummet. They remain underrepresented at California universities.

According to a study by the University of California Office of the President, the ban on affirmative action caused underrepresented minority freshman applicants “to cascade into lower-quality public and private universities.” Their rate of enrollment in STEM programs also declined, and the combined result is that they earned significantly less upon entering the job market, according to the study.

The Yes on 16, Opportunity for All Coalition spent more than $8 million to pass the measure, according to Ballotpedia.

Its supporters included the California Democratic Party, Senators Kamala Harris and Dianne Feinstein Rep. Nancy Pelosi, the University of California Board of Regents, the California Teachers Association, and the ACLU.

Opponents included the California Republican Party, State Senate Minority Leader Bob Huff and the Chinese American Civic Action Alliance. According to Ballotpedia, opponents have spent a little over half a million dollars to defeat the measure.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.