Update: DOJ Says Yale Discriminated Against Asian Americans

WASHINGTON, DC —In 2016, an Asian American filed a complaint with the Justice Department alleging race-based discrimination in admissions at Yale University and other Ivy League schools.

The New York Times reported in September 2018 that "civil-rights activist" Yukong Zhao accused Yale, Brown University and Dartmouth College of “unfairly" denying undergraduate admission to Asian-American applicants "by treating them differently based on their race during the admission process,” according to an Education Department letter obtained by the paper.

Thursday, the Department of Justice told Yale it found the University "illegally discriminates against Asian American and white applicants in its undergraduate admissions process in violation of Title VI of the 1964 Civil Rights Act."

The findings are the result of a two-year investigation in response to a complaint by Asian American groups concerning Yale’s conduct., the DOJ said in a news release.

But Yale says the DOJ concluded its investigation before reviewing all the data the university said it submitted.

"Yale has been fully cooperating with the DOJ investigation. We have produced large quantities of documents and data, and we are continuing to do so. However, the DOJ concluded its investigation before reviewing and receiving all the information it has requested," Yale president Peter Salovey said in a letter.

"The department’s allegation is baseless," Salovey said. "Given our university’s commitment to complying with federal law, I am dismayed that the DOJ inexplicably rushed to conclude its investigation without conducting a fully informed analysis, which would have shown that Yale’s practices absolutely comply with decades of Supreme Court precedent."

The Department of Justice said it found Yale "discriminates based on race and national origin in its undergraduate admissions process, and that race is the determinative factor in hundreds of admissions decisions each year."

"For the great majority of applicants, Asian Americans and whites have only one-tenth to one-fourth of the likelihood of admission as African American applicants with comparable academic credentials," the media release from DOJ reads. "Yale rejects scores of Asian American and white applicants each year based on their race, whom it otherwise would admit."

“There is no such thing as a nice form of race discrimination,” Assistant Attorney General Eric Dreiband for the Civil Rights Division said.

The DOJ noted that, "As a condition of receiving millions of dollars in taxpayer funding, Yale expressly agrees to comply with Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, a cornerstone civil-rights law that prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, color, or national origin in programs and activities that receive federal financial assistance."

Although the Supreme Court has held that colleges receiving federal funds may consider applicants’ race in certain limited circumstances as one of a number of factors, the Department of Justice found Yale’s use of race is anything but limited. Yale uses race at multiple steps of its admissions process resulting in a multiplied effect of race on an applicant’s likelihood of admission, and Yale racially balances its classes.

The Department of Justice has demanded Yale agree not to use race or national origin in its upcoming 2020-2021 undergraduate admissions cycle, and, if Yale proposes to consider race or national origin in future admissions cycles, it must first submit to the Department of Justice a plan demonstrating its proposal is narrowly tailored as required by law, including by identifying a date for the end of race discrimination.

But Yale says it's not changing a thing.

"Yale College will not change its admissions processes in response to today’s letter because the DOJ is seeking to impose a standard that is inconsistent with existing law," Salovey wrote.

"We will continue to look at the whole person when selecting whom to admit among the many thousands of highly qualified applicants. We will continue to look at what students have accomplished and hope to contribute to Yale and the world. We will continue to create a student body that is rich in a diverse range of ideas, expertise, and experiences. Such a student body greatly enhances students’ academic experiences and maximizes their future success. By bringing people of different backgrounds, talents, and perspectives together, we best prepare our students for a complex and dynamic world."