A conservative group filed a lawsuit Tuesday against Northwestern University’s law school, alleging that the group is violating federal law prohibiting discrimination on the basis of race and sex by attempting to hire more women and people of color as faculty members.
The complaint comes just over a year after the Supreme Court rejected the use of affirmative action in college admissions and is expected to be among the first in a series of new lawsuits challenging the way U.S. universities hire and promote professors.
The lawsuit, filed in federal district court in Chicago, alleges that the hiring process for professors at U.S. universities has become a “deep well of corruption and lawlessness.” It alleges that Northwestern deliberately excluded white male candidates for faculty positions and favored candidates of other races and gender identities.
Representatives of the law school did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
The complaint, filed by a group calling itself Faculty, Alumni and Students Opposed to Racial Preferences, named several candidates for teaching positions at Northwestern University, including well-known lawyers, who the group alleges were turned down for interviews or denied promotions.
“For decades, left-wing faculty and administrators have flouted federal anti-discrimination laws and openly discriminated on the basis of race and gender in hiring decisions,” the complaint states. “They do this by hiring women and racial minorities with mediocre and unremarkable records rather than white men with better qualifications, better scientific knowledge, and better teaching skills.”
Members of the group are not named in the complaint, but the plaintiffs’ lead attorney, Jonathan F. Mitchell, is a former Texas attorney general turned activist advocate for conservative causes. He is joined by Gene P. Hamilton, general counsel for the America First Legal Foundation, which bills itself as a conservative answer to the ACLU’s much deeper pockets.
The comprehensive approach to the complaint suggests that the group is explicitly positioning itself as a successor to Students for Fair Admissions, the group that sued universities on behalf of Asian American students who alleged discrimination in their college applications.
A year ago, these complaints led the Supreme Court to ban affirmative action in college admissions.
This is a developing story. Check back for updates.
