March 28 (UPI) — The U.S. Justice Department launched an investigation into the admission policies of five California universities to see if any still employ Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion practices.
Attorney General Pamela Bondi announced Thursday that her department’s Civil Rights Division had started compliance review checks at UCLA, UC Irvine, Stanford University, University of California and Berkeley.
She explained that her actions follow the U.S. Supreme Court‘s 2023 decision that stops universities and colleges from using DEI, and that she and President Donald Trump are “dedicated to ending illegal discrimination and restoring merit-based opportunity across the country.”
Bondi alleged that the “elite” schools have “prioritized racial quotas over equality of opportunity, dividing Americans and discriminating against entire groups of applicants, all in the name of DEI.”
“The Department of Justice will put an end to a shameful system in which someone’s race matters more than their ability,” said Acting Associate Attorney General Chad Mizelle. “Every college and university should know that illegal discrimination in admissions will be investigated and eliminated.”
Meanwhile, the University of Southern California, while not announced to be under investigation, said in a press release Thursday that it is “broadening” DEI into “Community.”
The school said that the term DEI “has evolved to encompass so many interpretations as it has increasingly become embroiled in broader cultural and political disagreements,” and that “recent evolving federal legal guidance further reinforces that our language and actions must be both precise and unambiguous.”