Trump Justice Department to Join Lawsuit Against UCLA Medical School for Illegal Racial Preferences in Admissions Decisions

The Trump Justice Department is seeking to intervene in the ongoing lawsuit against UCLA medical school for illegal racial preferences in admissions decisions.

Much of the government’s motion to intervene rehashes explosive allegations in the lawsuit filed last year that documented how a diversity-crazed admissions dean turned the process into a racial spoils system that favors blacks and other minorities over better qualified whites and Asians.

The lawsuit was filed by the anti-woke medical group Do No Harm, Students for Fair Admissions, and a white woman who claimed she was denied admission to UCLA’s David Geffen School of Medicine because of its racial preference policies.

But while that lawsuit relied on anecdotal evidence and whistleblower accounts of racial favoritism, the government has somehow obtained hard numbers that show UCLA is admitting blacks and Latinos with significantly lower median MCAT scores than whites and Latinos.

For example, the Justice Department motion says that, “According to data reviewed by the United States, UCLA Med’s class incoming in 2024 has median MCAT scores of 508 for Black, 506 for Hispanic, 515 for Asian, and 513 for White matriculants. These correspond to percentile rankings of 75, 66, 90, and 86, respectively.”

Stanley Goldfarb, MD, the founder of Do No Harm, told the California Globe that the differential in MCAT scores is troubling.

“It reflects that the students being admitted perform less well. We know that academic performance does correlate with clinical performance. [People] want the doctor who is the smartest person and [the] one who performed the best to be their physician.”

Goldfarb also said the Justice Department action is “quite significant” because it gives “more validity” to his lawsuit.

United States District Court for the Central District of California Judge John Holcomb has scheduled a hearing for February 27 on the Justice Department’s motion to intervene in the case.

“As the Supreme Court has made clear, admission into our nation’s educational institutions cannot be based on discriminatory racial policies, “ said Attorney General Pam Bondi. “[The] intervention is the Department of Justice’s latest effort to hold our universities accountable for unlawful policy–especially in the state of California.”

“Even after the Supreme Court banned race-balancing, the Geffen School kept discriminating  by using illegal DEI preferences in admissions,” said Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division. “This Civil Rights Division will not tolerate such conduct and welcomes the Court’s role in ensuring justice.”

The government motion scorches UCLA medical school for a “systemically racist” approach to admissions that is “illegal under the Fourteenth Amendment as interpreted by the US Supreme Court.”

It says that UCLA medical school engages “in a system of racial balancing that provides racial preferences in admissions, and thereby treats applicants differently based on their race, all in violation of the equal protection rights of applicants.”

“UCLA Med uses a “holistic” application review method to disguise this systemic racism” by asking applicants seemingly neutral questions that are actually intended to determine their race.

The motion also includes a broadside that spells out what it says are the three “disastrous outcomes” of racial preferences.

“First, if UCLA Med and other medical schools lower their academic standards to obtain the “right” racial mix, the result is less well academically qualified doctors practicing medicine. Second, by lowering academic standards for certain applicants, patients will question whether their Underrepresented Minority (“URM,” meaning Black, Hispanic, Pacific Islander, or Native American) doctor is really qualified to practice medicine and can give them the same quality care as a White or Asian doctor who did not receive preferential admission to medical school. This shadow follows URM doctors throughout their careers, whether or not that doctor needed a preference to be  admitted to medical school. Third, it undermines and delays delivery upon the promise enshrined in the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution that each state government, including UCLA Med, will treat its citizens equally without regard to their race.”

The David Geffen School of Medicine communications office did not reply to repeated requests for comment.

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