Exclusive | Trump admin pushed to probe CUNY Black Male program for blocking out other students

A legal advocacy group wants the Trump administration to step in to probe CUNY‘s Black Male Initiative over claims it discriminates against women and white students.The Equal Protection Project claims the CUNY program violates federal civil rights laws by giving preference to minority male students while shutting out others.“It’s not a difficult case – CUNY explicitly is recruiting based on race and ethnicity and preferring certain racial and ethnic groups over others,” said William Jacobson, president and founder of the group, which filed a complaint with the Justice Department’s Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights Harmeet Dhillon.In 2012, the Obama Department of Education determined that the initiative was consistent with federal law.“The discrimination in the program should have been stopped almost 15 years ago,” Jacobson said.“Only a legally ridiculous 2012 decision by the Obama Department of Education allowed the discrimination to continue.

It is time for DOJ to correct this injustice.”The mission of the Black Male Initiative is to bolster the enrollment, retention, grade point average and graduation rates of minority male students in 22 senior and community colleges within the CUNY system.It has been in place for 20 years.In its complaint, EPP claims the program also violates state and city anti-discrimination laws.But since New York’s lawmakers have allocated millions of dollars over the years to fund BMI, Albany and City Hall won’t investigate.CUNY defended the program as legal and appropriate.“For 21 years the CUNY Black Male Initiative has focused on improving the educational success of underrepresented students and is open to all students regardless of race, gender or national origin,” a CUNY spokesperson said.One CUNY source said Sunday the Male Initiative is a well-intended program to address the dearth of young minority men attending and graduating from colleges.The group admitted in its complaint that the initiati...