Former president and first lady Barrack and Michelle Obama, “The 1619 Project” Pulitzer winner Nikole Hannah-Jones, “The Handmaid’s Tale” author Joyce Carol Oates and many more have weighed in on the U.S. Supreme Court ruling overturning affirmative action programs Thursday, deeming them as unconstitutional.
The Supreme Court struck down race-conscious admissions programs at the University of North Carolina and Harvard University in its ruling, thereby striking down comparable programs nationwide. The ruling claimed that the programs violate the Equal Protection Clause of the Constitution, an amendment previously cited to lessen discrimination against Black Americans that affirms that no state can “deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”