ICYMI: Ranking Member Simon Calls Out Republicans’ Misguided Priorities During Opening Statement at House Oversight Committee Task Force Hearing on “The Future of DEI in Law School Accreditation and the Legal Profession”
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Today, the House Oversight Committee’s Task Force on Defending Constitutional Rights and Exposing Institutional Abuses held a hearing focused on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) policies in law school admissions and the law school accreditation process.
In her opening remarks, Ranking Member Lateefah Simon (D-CA-12) questioned why Republicans are focused on diversity policies in law school admissions that impact only 0.02% of the American population, while neglecting the millions of people who are struggling to afford healthcare and basic needs as a result of Republican policies like the “Big, Ugly, Cruel Bill.” In case you missed it, Congresswoman Simon’s opening remarks can be found below.
“I want to talk to this room about what you're going to hear in the next hour, because the script is not new. We'll hear that a private, independent association of attorneys [The American Bar Association (ABA)] is the “great racial menace” of our age. We will hear the word merit spoken as if opportunity has ever truly been distributed by merit in this country. And we will hear that a diversity standard, already suspended and repealed somehow still threatens the republic. The majority has convened the machinery of the United States congress to prosecute a rule that no longer is in question, at an institution that has already capitulated to the President of the United States, and they call this exercise “oversight.” It's not oversight, it's theater.
“I ask is this conversation helping Americans? Last year, fewer than 1 in 10,000 Americans applied to an ABA accredited law school. That's 0.02% of the population. Yet this is what the majority chooses to investigate today.
“While 10 million Americans will lose their health insurance because of the law [The Big, Cruel, Ugly Bill] that the majority wrote just last year, which made the deepest cuts to Medicaid in our country's history, the American Bar Association cast no vote on that bill, but 209 Republicans did.
“4 million people have already lost their food assistance, faster than the Congressional Budget Office predicted. This Congress ordered a 64-year-old woman to prove her work hours before she could keep groceries on the table. It ended exemptions for our veterans, people experiencing homelessness and children aging out of foster care. No bar association wrote a word of it, but the Republicans did.
“5,843 National Institutes of Health research grants have been terminated or frozen. 383 clinical trials, with more than 74,000 people enrolled. Those are folks fighting cancer. Children with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) are struggling and waiting for another call of a possible clinical trial, only again to be turned away because of this Administration's actions. And the Trump Administration decided that these 74,000 people [in clinical trials], that their lives weren't worth it.
“More than 100 schoolgirls are buried beneath the rubble from American munitions in a war that no Americans asked for, but no lawyers association put those babies in the ground. My colleagues, however, financed it.
“So, if the American Bar Association did none of those things, why is the American Bar Association on deck? I will tell you why. Because they sued the President when lawyers were stripped of their security clearances for representing his critics. When law firms were pressured into nearly $1 billion in tribute to our President, the ABA went to federal court and judge after judge ruled that the Administration's actions were unconstitutional. The government’s lawyers argued only that no one had standing to sue. So, the hearing that you're in today is an answer to that lawsuit, a task force with the word ‘constitutional’ in its title, has been assembled to collect a political debt for the President, a President that the courts keep ruling against.
“And since the majority insists on talking about racism, let's consult the record. In 1912, the ABA expelled three black lawyers it had admitted by mistake, including William H. Lewis, then the Assistant General Attorney of the United States. Because of its settled practice to only admit white men after public outrage, the ABA reinstated them. Then it amended its application process so that every future applicant had to declare their race. It knowingly admitted no other black lawyers for another three decades. So, the diversity standard on trial today was a part of the ABA’s effort to reckon with that history. The majority arrives a century late, silent about the discrimination, yet furious about its repair. The Constitution is not endangered because more Americans entered the legal profession. It is endangered when power is used to punish those who challenge it. When oversight becomes retaliation, and when congress mistakes grievance for governance, history will remember which side that choice we stood on. And I yield back. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Oversight Democrats on the Task Force, led by Congresswoman Simon, will examine systemic barriers and unlawful discrimination in employment, education, housing, and healthcare; fight for the protection of essential services and programs; and fight for guaranteed access to critical goods despite political pushbacks. Oversight Democrats will also utilize the Task Force to address broader matters related to civil rights, democratic governance, and equal justice under law to ensure all Americans can be supported and contribute to their nation.
###