Coalition for TJ v. Fairfax County School Board

Docket number: No. 23-170 (4th Cir.)

On September 20, HLLI joined the American Civil Rights Project and the Manhattan Institute to support Coalition for TJ’s petition for certiorari challenging Fairfax County School Board’s race-based admissions scheme as a violation of the Constitution’s equal protection guarantee.

At the district court, Coalition for TJ–a group of over 5,000 parents, students, alumni, staff, and community members of top-ranked public high school Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology–pleaded and proved that the School Board violated the Fourteenth Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause by adopting a policy intended to achieve racial discrimination against Asian Americans.

The district court specifically found that: (a) “[t]hroughout the process, Board members … expressed their desire to remake TJ admissions because they were dissatisfied with the racial composition of the school”; (b) the Board’s related “discussion of TJ admissions changes was infected with talk of racial balancing from its inception”; (c) the Board sought “to accomplish their goal of achieving racial balance” by “decreas[ing] enrollment of the only racial group ‘overrepresented’ at TJ—Asian Americans”; (d) the Board pursued that end by designing a new admissions policy that would “increase Black and Hispanic enrollment [and,] by necessity, decrease the representation of Asian-Americans”; and (e) the Board achieved its end—the new program they adopted “has had, and will have, a substantial disparate impact on Asian American applicants to TJ.”

The amicus brief argues that the Fourth Circuit’s reversal of that decision abused precedent, erased the finding that the board intentionally race-balanced, and applied the wrong standard. HLLI made the point that allocating children’s educational opportunities based on race has always been wrong. The brief further discussed evidence casting serious doubt on the idea that TJ’s enhanced racially-scored “diversity” improved any student’s education.

Cert was denied over a dissent on February 20, 2024.