BREAKING: 1st Circuit Court of Appeals rules that although SFFA has standing to bring their anti-affirmative action lawsuit against Harvard, Harvard has presented ample evidence demonstrating that their admissions process is lawful.

Full decision: http://media.ca1.uscourts.gov/pdf.opinions/19-2005P-01A.pdf

For those not following affirmative action news, the SFFA v. Harvard lawsuit was engineered by Abigail Fisher and Republican lobbyist Ed Blum, and which recruited disgruntled Asian Americans to take the place as plaintiffs for their latest effort to dismantle affirmative action.

Abigail Fisher is the plaintiff in two anti-affirmative action SCOTUS cases involving Fisher's assertion that as a white woman, she had been discriminated against by the University of Texas in their admissions policies. In 2016, SCOTUS ruled that UT's admissions were legal.

SFFA v. Harvard is seen by many as an effort to relitigate the same question, but using Asian Americans instead of Fisher. Critics see the use of AsAms here as tokenizing, and point out that in national surveys most Asian Americans actually say they support affirmative action.

Today's ruling is a major victory in protecting aff action, but this lawsuit was always intended for Supreme Court. I'm not a legal scholar, but I expect that SFFA will be moving forward to try and get in front of SCOTUS ASAP, esp. with Court makeup likely to favor their side.

If you are interested in getting involved in combatting this effort to use AsAm faces to dismantle affirmative action, you should check out the work of @AAAJ_AAJC @aaldef and other Asian American civil rights groups who have been working on this issue for decades.

Also, check this excellent thread by incredible conn law prof @nancyleong: https://twitter.com/nancyleong/status/1326891726913507328?s=20