Former White House adviser Stephen Miller sent a testy message to top law schools over the weekend following the Supreme Court’s decision banning colleges from using affirmative action in their admission decisions.
The Republican gadfly preemptively pestered 200 of the nation’s law school deans with the threat of legal action if they “violate, circumvent, bypass, subvert or otherwise program around” the ruling in Students for Fair Admissions cases against Harvard University and the University of North Carolina.
In its decision, the Supreme Court determined colleges cannot consider race as a factor in admissions based on the 14th Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause.
Miller, who served as a top adviser to President Donald Trump from 2017 to 2021 and is now the president of America First Legal, announced his legal plans in a smug Twitter video on Saturday.
In the video, he told followers, “Today, we sent a warning letter to the deans of 200 law schools around America, telling them that they must obey the Supreme Court’s ruling striking down illegal racial discrimination and affirmative action.”
“If they try to violate, circumvent, bypass, subvert or otherwise program around that ruling, we are going to take them to court,” Miller went on. “We are going to hold them to account.”
Further details about the campaign were not clear. HuffPost has reached out to America First Legal requesting more information about its plans.
While this week’s Supreme Court decision dealt a heavy blow to the practice of race-conscious college admissions, the opinion does not bar university applicants from discussing race outright.
The ruling, authored by Chief Justice John Roberts, still allows prospective students to discuss race in regard to their individual life experiences.
Affirmative action policies emerged after the civil rights movement of the 1960s, aiming to increase educational opportunities for Black and Latino students.
The policies incited accusations of “reverse racism” from white Americans, and in recent years, conservatives have argued affirmative action unfairly disadvantages Asian American college applicants.
Asian American students’ claims were the basis for both of the cases that led the Supreme Court to declare affirmative action programs in colleges unconstitutional.
Studies show that abandoning the practice will have profound effects on the number of Black and Latino students accepted into the nation’s most selective schools.
In a dissenting opinion, Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote, “The Court subverts the constitutional guarantee of equal protection by further entrenching racial inequality in education, the very foundation of our democratic government and pluralistic society.”
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson authored a dissent regarding the case against UNC, writing, “It is no small irony that the judgment the majority hands down today will forestall the end of race-based disparities in this country, making the colorblind world the majority wistfully touts much more difficult to accomplish.”
Miller’s America First Legal group has made a habit of inserting itself into hot-button conservative conflicts.
In May, the group hinted at action against beer giant Anheuser-Busch after its flagship brand Bud Light partnered with transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney.
America First Legal asked shareholders upset with companies “promoting transgender, LGBTQ and PRIDE products” to get in contact, signaling possible plans for a class-action suit.
In 2021, AFL filed suit against the Biden administration, accusing them of discriminating against white farmers in its $1.9 billion COVID relief plans.
During the 2022 midterm elections, the group paid for radio ads accusing President Biden and his administration of broad discrimination, asking, “When did racism against white people become OK?”