The U.S. Air Force Academy Cadet Wing march onto the field prior to a football game, Oct. 5, 2024, at the U.S. Air Force Acadmy, Colo. (Dylan Smith/U.S. Air Force)
A group that opposes the use of racial preferences in college admissions has sued the U.S. Air Force Academy and the Defense Department, continuing its drive to end the practice at all institutions of higher education in the wake of a landmark Supreme Court ruling last year.
The group, Students for Fair Admissions (SFFA), argues that the academy has no legal justification for its admissions policies.
The Air Force Academy “is one of the American military’s premier institutions and the most prestigious source of commissioned officers in the Air Force,” the group argues in its complaint, filed Tuesday in the U.S. District Court for the District of Colorado. “It is also one of the last remaining universities to expressly consider race as a factor in admissions.”
The lawsuit comes just days after a judge’s ruling allowing the U.S. Naval Academy to continue to use race-conscious admissions policies.
In that case in U.S. District Court in Baltimore, also brought by SFFA, Senior District Judge Richard D. Bennett held that the Naval Academy’s limited consideration of race “furthers the government’s compelling national security interests.”
The group has said it will file an appeal to an appellate court and, if necessary, the Supreme Court.
Over the past few decades, SFFA President Edward Blum said, “the Air Force Academy and our other military academies have strayed from their former colorblind, merit-based admissions policies and now focus on race and ethnicity — factors that do not contribute to the qualifications of applicants.” Blum argued that because the Supreme Court ruling last year “expressly forbids all institutions of higher education from using race in admissions decisions, it must follow that the Air Force Academy must end their race-based policies as well.”
The Air Force Academy did not immediately respond to a request for comment Wednesday. A spokesperson for the Defense Department said the department does not comment on pending litigation.
The Supreme Court rejected race-conscious affirmative action in college admissions this past year, ruling in cases brought by SFFA against Harvard and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. That ruling — which overturned decades of legal precedent — not only changed the way highly sought-after colleges consider applicants for admission but accelerated legal challenges to diversity programs at government agencies and private companies.
The decision in Students for Fair Admissions v. President & Fellows of Harvard College held that Harvard and UNC’s admissions programs violated the Constitution’s guarantee of equal protection.
But it included a notable exception for the country’s military academies, with a footnote that mentioned “the potentially distinct interests that military academies may present.”
For many years and over multiple administrations, Defense Department leaders have maintained that a racially diverse officer corps, one that reflects the fighting force, is important to national security; a lack of diversity historically led to dangerous tensions, including race riots, that threatened military preparedness. And Solicitor General Elizabeth B. Prelogar had argued to justices in the Harvard case that it is not possible to achieve a diverse officer corps without affirmative action in the military academies.
SFFA quickly challenged that exception to the Supreme Court decision.
