Will County Gazette

JB Pritzker is blasting the Supreme Court's decision to effectively gut the law allowing schools to consider race in making college admissions decisions on July 1.

"The damage caused to Black communities by slavery and Jim Crow Laws, to Hispanics and Native Americans by a legacy of discrimination and oppression has not nearly been reversed. For centuries, students from historically underrepresented and underserved communities were locked out of higher education — preventing upward mobility and stunting economic development for generations to come. Affirmative action admissions practices were a critical step towards creating educational environments that are representative of our diverse nation while righting the wrongs of our past."

As part of his statement, Pritzker pledged that the state of Illinois will "continue to uplift our students of color — promoting inclusion and expanding access through record-levels of funding for higher education institutions and our MAP Grant Program so that every student has the opportunity to earn a degree."

In penning the opinion for the conservative majority, Chief Justice John Roberts stated the Harvard and University of North Carolina admissions programs violated the Equal Protection Clause because they failed to offer “measurable” objectives to justify the use of race and involved stereotypes, and had no specific endpoint.

The new ruling allows U.S. military service academies to continue to take race into consideration as a factor in making admissions decisions and comes after Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar argued during oral arguments in favor of that position.