Biden: SCOTUS ‘not a normal court,’ proposes affirmative action alternative

President Biden said the Supreme Court “is not a normal court” when asked by a reporter if it’s a “rogue court.” The statement came after remarks about the court’s decision to end race-based admissions at colleges and universities around the country. 

During his speech, the president suggested that admissions offices should consider adversity as a factor instead of race to ensure colleges maintain diverse student bodies. 

“Students first have to be qualified applicants. They need the GPA and test scores to meet the school’s standards. Once that test is met, then adversity should be considered, including — including its lack – a student’s lack of financial means, because we know too few students of low-income families, whether in big cities or rural communities, are getting an opportunity to go to college,” President Biden said.

“It also means examining where a student grew up and went to high school. It means understanding particular hardships that each individual student has faced in life, including racial discrimination,” the president added.

Chief Justice John Roberts wrote about that in the majority opinion which states, “nothing in this opinion should be construed as prohibiting universities from considering an applicant’s discussion of how race affected his or her life, be it through discrimination, inspiration, or otherwise.”

But the president of the organization that filed the lawsuit that led to this decision said they will be on the lookout for colleges that try to use workarounds to the Supreme Court’s decision. 

“We remain vigilant and intend to initiate litigation should universities defiantly flout this clear ruling and the dictates of Title VI and the equal protection clause,” Edward Blum, Students for Fair Admissions president, said. 

Justice Sandra Day O’Connor seemed to predict this outcome in 2003 when she wrote the Grutter v. Bollinger decision which found that race-based admissions was constitutional. 

“We expect that 25 years from now, the use of racial preferences will no longer be necessary to further the interest approved today,” O’Connor wrote.

But in the current decision, Chief Justice Roberts said colleges and universities have not made any meaningful progress toward a color-blind admissions process since that time.