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Trump’s Next Fight With Universities: Racial ‘Proxies’ in Admissions
The Trump administration is warning colleges against using application essays, geography and other “unlawful proxies” for race to achieve diverse student bodies
After months of targeting universities over antisemitism allegations, the Trump administration is turning to a new focus: whether schools are using proxies for race in admissions to diversify student bodies.
This emphasis is emerging in recent edicts from federal agencies and in the White House’s scrutiny of specific universities.
In late July, Attorney General Pam Bondi warned in a memo against using “unlawful proxies” for race—such as geography or applicant essays on overcoming hardships—in admissions. Soon after, the U.S. Education Department announced it would require universities to report new data on applicants, broken down by race, to “ensure race-based preferences are not used.”
Universities have been prohibited from using racial preferences in admissions since the Supreme Court struck down affirmative action in 2023. The Trump administration suggests schools may be flouting the ban, though universities say they comply.
For conservatives and the administration, the current push represents a common-sense strategy to enforce and extend the Supreme Court’s ruling. Others say this approach distorts the court decision and could depress Black student enrollment, which has already fallen at some top colleges.
“There’s an effort to say that the law is something that it’s not. There’s an effort to say that it’s illegal to seek to have a diverse student body,” said Peter McDonough, general counsel for the American Council on Education, a university lobbying group.
In the Supreme Court ruling, Chief Justice John Roberts wrote that in college admissions, a “student must be treated based on his or her experiences as an individual—not on the basis of race.”
“Nothing in this opinion should be construed as prohibiting universities from considering an applicant’s discussion of how race affected his or her life,” Roberts added. However, “universities may not simply establish through application essays or other means the regime we hold unlawful today.”
Since the ruling, university leaders have vowed to scrap explicit considerations of race, while also adopting strategies, such as broader recruitment, to maintain racial diversity.
In 2024, the share of Black freshmen dropped significantly in some—though not all—elite colleges. Interpreting this shift is difficult because of a rise in students who declined to state their race and technical challenges with that year’s financial-aid form.
Some conservatives question schools where Black enrollment didn’t fall. “I suspect a goodly percentage are using illegal proxies,” said Edward Blum, an activist who helped bring the case against affirmative action to the Supreme Court. He noted that many universities had said it would be impossible to maintain racial diversity without affirmative action.
‘Cross-cultural skills’
The Trump administration hasn’t presented direct evidence of widespread efforts to defy the affirmative-action ban. Blum said such evidence could emerge in future litigation.
In their recent resolutions with the administration on a number of issues, Columbia and Brown agreed to not use applicants’ personal statements to “introduce or justify discrimination.”
Amanda McGregor, a spokeswoman for Brown, said the university’s agreement with Trump shouldn’t be “misconstrued as any indication of any finding related to our commitment to fair and lawful admissions.”
A Columbia spokeswoman, Virginia Lam Abrams, said its federal agreement reflects an “ongoing commitment to following existing law related to admissions.”
The administration is also pressing for $1 billion from UCLA and a pledge to “eliminate identity-based preferences” for admissions, scholarships and hiring.
The University of California system has been complying with California’s ban on affirmative action for decades, said spokesman Omar Rodriguez. “At the same time, we remain committed to expanding access for all qualified students,” he said.
In the July Justice Department memo from Bondi, the Trump administration warned against “ostensibly neutral criteria that function as substitutes for explicit consideration of race.” For instance, it noted that “diversity statements,” or asking applicants about “cross-cultural skills” or “obstacles they have overcome,” could be illegal if used to advantage certain races.
The National Association for College Admission Counseling has emphasized to its members that the memo isn’t legally binding, said the group’s CEO Angel Pérez. “I don’t think most institutions are jumping and immediately changing practices.”
The memo also said that measures to benefit low-income students can’t be targeted to “areas or populations to achieve racial or sex-based outcomes.” A DOJ spokeswoman declined to elaborate.
To some, the suggestion that race-neutral measures could be illegal if they seek to achieve racial diversity marked a striking goal-post shift from what opponents of affirmative action have previously argued.
Conservative justices have long suggested schools could maintain racial diversity through nonracial strategies, noted Yale law professor Justin Driver. “Universities prohibited from engaging in racial discrimination by state law continue to enroll racially diverse classes by race-neutral means,” wrote Justice Clarence Thomas, in a concurrence in the affirmative-action case.
Richard Kahlenberg testified as an expert witness in the case, arguing against traditional affirmative action on the grounds that schools can achieve racial diversity through other methods, such as through preferences for students from poor families. “The Department of Justice can’t change the law, but the fear is it could intimidate some universities,” said Kahlenberg, who works at the center-left Progressive Policy Institute.
The DOJ memo is a “very aggressive interpretation of the law,” said David Bernstein, a law professor at George Mason University.
The Trump administration has previously faced legal challenges to restricting campus diversity efforts. In February, the Education Department laid out its interpretation of the affirmative-action decision, saying that universities can’t eliminate standardized testing requirements to increase racial diversity. But three federal courts have halted enforcement of this guidance.
Legal cases have percolated since the 2023 Supreme Court ruling. In one closely watched case, a conservative legal group challenged a Virginia high school’s admissions policy change. Though the policy didn’t explicitly consider race, it resulted in more Black and Hispanic students and fewer Asian students. Plaintiffs contended the policy shift was racially motivated. The district said it had no discriminatory intent.
A federal appeals court sided with the school district and the Supreme Court declined to grant review—though the Trump administration recently launched its own investigation into the school’s admission practices.
Erin Wilcox, an attorney who argued the Virginia case, said similar suits are ongoing and noted the Supreme Court hasn’t weighed in on the new breed of diversity efforts.
“If you’re not allowed to do that using an outright racial decision, you’re not allowed to do that using a racial proxy either,” said Wilcox of the Pacific Legal Foundation.
Write to Matt Barnum at matt.barnum@wsj.com
