Author: Gail Heriot

Gail Heriot is a law professor at the University of San Diego and a member of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights. She co-chaired the Yes on Proposition 209 Campaign in 1996.

Scheming to Revive Racial Preferences in California

California’s deep-blue legislature has been itching to repeal Proposition 209 for years. Now, in the midst of a global pandemic, legislators are giving that effort priority over the state’s plainly more urgent concerns. Shame on them. Adopted by voters in 1996, Proposition 209 amended California’s constitution to prohibit the state from engaging in preferential treatment […]

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Obama and the Texas Suit against Preferences

The Obama Department of Justice is keen to support those who seek to expand racial preferences. The latest case is Fisher v. University of Texas, in which two young white women, Abigail Fisher and Rachel Michalewicz, argue that the University’s diversity policy-one of the more aggressive in the nation– violates their right to equal protection. […]

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How Mismatches Devastate Minority Students

By Gail Heriot (Ms. Heriot is a member of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights. This piece is adapted from Ms. Heriot’s Commissioner Statement for the Civil Rights Report on Affirmative Action at American Law Schools released last fall.) I have no doubt that those who originally conceived of race-based admissions policies – nearly forty […]

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