UCLA medical school uses a 'systemically racist approach' to admissions, DOJ alleges

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The Trump administration on Wednesday sought to join a lawsuit filed in federal court alleging UCLA’s David Geffen School of Medicine illegally considers race inits admission process.In documents filed in California’s Central District, the Department of Justice alleges that UCLA’s medical school uses a “systemically racist approach” to admissions that privileges Black and Latino applicants over those who are white and Asian American.Justice Department lawyers also allege that the school engages in “racial balancing” — trying to create a student body that is racially reflective of California — in violation the U.S.

Constitution’s Equal Protection Clause and a 2023 U.S.Supreme Court decision that banned race-based affirmative action policies in college admissions.The 17-page filing is in response to a May lawsuit by Do No Harm — a group founded in 2022 to oppose “disastrous consequences of identity politics” in medicine — and Students for Fair Admissions, the organization that filed a suit leading to the Supreme Court ruling.

Kelly Mahoney, a white woman who said she was rejected by the UCLA medical school because of her race, is also a plaintiff.California The federal class-action lawsuit was filed to stop the medical school and UCLA officials from allegedly “engaging in intentional discrimination on the basis of race and ethnicity in the admissions process.”The original suit cited unnamed “whistleblowers” who allege that Jennifer Lucero, the medical school’s associate dean of admissions, “requires applicants to submit responses that are intended to allow the committee to glean the applicant’s race” and that she and admissions officers “routinely and openly” have discussed using race in admissions.Lucero did not respond to a email requesting comment.

In a statement, UCLA medical school spokesman Phil Hampton said that UCLA does n...