(Bloomberg) -- Harvard University said a lawsuit by Asian-Americans who claim the school discriminated against them during the admissions process should be dismissed because their arguments are based on “invective, mis-characterizations and in some cases outright misrepresentations.”
The Ivy League school told a federal judge on Monday that the case didn’t need to go to trial for her to rule in Harvard’s favor, arguing the suit was nothing but a “litigation vehicle” advancing the ideological objectives of Edward Blum, the leader of the plaintiffs’ group, pointing to other suits he’s backed challenging affirmative-action policies.
Harvard denied it engages in “racial balancing” or factors in race in a manner beyond what the Supreme Court permits. Not only are the plaintiffs’ filings “replete with blatantly false statements,” Harvard said, but also the Students for Fair Admissions group is merely a “mailing list” of people Blum recruited to support his cause.
The suit was filed in 2014, and the Trump administration indicated it’s sympathetic to the group’s argument. The Justice Department weighed in in April, urging the judge to publicly release years of admissions data provided by Harvard. The government said it has a “substantial interest” in the lawsuit because it’s conducting a probe of similar allegations.
The case is Students for Fair Admissions Inc. v. President and Fellows of Harvard College, 14-cv-14176, U.S. District Court, District of Massachusetts (Boston).
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