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Bush Is On Record as Opposing Racial and Ethnic Preferences

Thursday, 02 January 2003

Contact: Roger Clegg (703)421-5443 Chavez and Connerly Call on Bush to Stand by His Principles (Sterling, VA) — Linda Chavez of the Center for Equal Opportunity (CEO) and Ward Connerly of the American Civil Rights Institute (ACRI) called on President Bush today to oppose racial and ethnic preferences before the Supreme Court, and stressed Bush’s record of consistent opposition to such discrimination.     CEO has posted on its website a questionnaire that then-Governor Bush filled out in 1998 when running for reelection.  In it, he was asked whether he agreed or disagreed with the statement “For the sake of obtaining a diversity of viewpoints and experiences, public educational institutions should be allowed to consider the race and ethnicity of applicants.”      Governor Bush checked the box marked “Disagree.”  In addition, he wrote in the following statement:  “I do not support race-based quotas or preferences.  Public colleges and universities have an affirmative duty to offer equal opportunity to all applicants.  Equal opportunity doesn’t guarantee equal results—but it guarantees that every person will get a fair shot based upon their potential, heart and merit.”      Connerly and Chavez called on President Bush to stand by his stated views.  They urged him to direct his administration’s lawyers to file briefs with the Supreme Court in two cases involving the University of Michigan’s use of racial and ethnic admission preferences, opposing such discrimination and the school’s argument that a desire for “diversity” trumps the nondiscrimination principle.     Chavez and Connerly pointed out that President Bush also stated his opposition to racial and ethnic preferences on at least two occasions when he was running for president.  On August 14, 1999, while appearing on CNN’s Evans & Novak, Bush stated:  “I want to end quotas, racial preferences, policies that tend to pit one group of people against another.  That’s what I mean by ‘affirmative access,’ which stands in stark contrast to a system that says all we got to do is meet some government-imposed and government-defined quota.”     During his debate with Al Gore on October 17, 2000, Bush repeated his opposition to quotas, which he said “pit one against another” and are “bad for America.”  He reiterated his support, instead, for race-neutral “affirmative access.”     “If the Bush administration fails to oppose what the president calls ‘the soft bigotry of low expectations’ at the University of Michigan,” said Chavez, “millions of people—the overwhelming majority of all Americans, of all skin colors and ethnicities—will be deeply disappointed.”  Connerly added, “President Bush has proven his leadership mettle in fighting terrorists who hate our way of life.  It is now time to defend here at home one of those principles—equal treatment for all Americans—that we are fighting to defend around the globe.”