Right-wing SCOTUS justices are not acting alone

The right-wing gang of six justices on the Supreme Court just ruled that affirmative action in university admissions at Harvard and the University of North Carolina violates the Constitution

- Jesse Jackson

Do not be fooled. This ruling is not limited to the elite universities that seek to ensure diversity in their student bodies. It is not limited to education. The right-wing majority on the Court is escalating the war on the Reconstruction that was launched by the civil rights movement.

The Court ruled that race is a suspect category even when used to remedy discrimination.

This ruling will be invoked to reverse efforts to guarantee equal employment opportunities, to provide opportunities for minority contractors, to counter discriminatory housing restrictions, and to challenge hate crimes motivated by race. With this ruling, the Court declares that it is not only blind to the systemic racism that still scars this nation; but hostile to efforts to remedy that racism, arguing that they offend the Constitution. As Justice Katanji Brown Jackson wrote in her blistering dissent, "This is a tragedy for us all."

The decision of the gang of six, written by Chief Justice John Roberts, is only part of the Court's assault on equal rights under the law. Roberts also penned the court decision in Shelby County v. Holder that gutted the Voting Rights Act and has opened the gates to racially discriminatory election measures in dozens of states.