Berkeley Law's Continued Race-Conscious Admissions Constitutes Deliberate, Accountable Legal Violation
Source: Jay Rogers. "DOJ Goes After Berkeley For Discrimination Vs. White Applicants." September 16, 2026. thefederalist.com
The Gist
The author argues that Berkeley Law got caught by federal investigators deliberately dodging a Supreme Court ban on race-based admissions, using coded language and identity-sorting to secretly favor some racial groups over others. He says this wasn't an innocent mistake but a knowing violation of the law, and that the people who designed this scheme should personally face consequences, not just the school as a whole.
Conclusion
Berkeley Law knowingly and deliberately continued to discriminate by race in admissions after being legally barred from doing so, constituting a willful breach of duty that warrants personal accountability for administrators, not just institutional remediation.
Premises
- Federal investigators (DOJ and Department of Education) found that Berkeley Law discriminated against Asian and white applicants in the 2024 and 2025 entering classes, in violation of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
- The Supreme Court's 2023 ruling in Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard clearly barred using race itself as a plus factor in admissions, while permitting consideration of how race shaped an individual's personal narrative.
- Berkeley's own admissions data show statistically significant racial disparities that persisted after the ruling: black applicants had 5.8-6.5 times the odds of admission of similarly qualified white applicants after controlling for LSAT/GPA, with substantial gaps in median LSAT scores.
- Berkeley allegedly used a 'diversity contribution' essay prompt and sorted students by 'primary identity' into sections, which the DOJ characterizes as a racial proxy designed to circumvent the ruling.
- Berkeley Law Dean Erwin Chemerinsky stated in 2022 that colleges would need to find ways to achieve diversity 'that can't be documented as violating the Constitution,' which the author interprets as an explicit admission of intent to evade the law.
- This pattern is not isolated to Berkeley: similar findings have been made against Duke Law, and investigations are underway at numerous medical schools (Yale, UCLA, UC Davis, Harvard, Johns Hopkins, Stanford), suggesting systemic evasion across elite legal and medical education.
- Because doctors and lawyers hold significant responsibility over people's lives and liberty, merit-based admissions in these fields is especially critical, making the alleged discrimination more consequential than in other academic contexts.
Assumptions
- Statistical disparities in admission odds after controlling for LSAT/GPA are sufficient evidence of intentional racial discrimination rather than other explanatory factors (e.g., holistic review criteria not captured by the two metrics).
- A dean's public statement about seeking legally defensible ways to achieve diversity is equivalent to an admission of intent to violate the law, rather than a statement about pursuing lawful diversity efforts.
- LSAT scores and undergraduate GPA are adequate proxies for 'merit' or 'qualification' in law school admissions.
- Administrators who design admissions policies later found unlawful should be held personally liable, analogous to fiduciary breach, even though administrative/civil rights law and fiduciary law are distinct legal frameworks.
- The DOJ/Department of Education findings represent settled fact rather than preliminary or contestable determinations that Berkeley may dispute.
- Racial diversity efforts in admissions are inherently in tension with 'merit' rather than potentially complementary to it.