A federal judge in Texas has ruled that the U.S. Minority Business Development Agency, founded during the Nixon administration, must avail itself to disadvantaged entrepreneurs of all races and ethnicities, including whites.
The summary judgment rendered on Tuesday by U.S. District Judge Mark Pittman, appointed in 2019 by then-President Donald Trump, was the latest in a recent series of federal court decisions rolling back decades of affirmative action programs aimed at remedying racial discrimination.
Pittman, a judge in the Forth Worth branch of the Northern Texas District, sided with two white businessmen who sued the Minority Business Development Agency (MBDA), a branch of the Commerce Department, last year after being denied benefits on the basis of race.
The plaintiffs were told they were ineligible for agency assistance because they were not members of any of the races or ethnicities included on a list of qualified minorities presumed to be disadvantaged and thus entitled to services, according to the judge’s summary of the case.
I wish your belief that racism didn’t effect people’s abilities to get jobs, loans, education, etc where true but alas it’s not. You of course supplied not evidence that such problems no longer exist.
If you worked at a staffing agency for a little while you’d discover pretty quickly there are still companies that won’t hire people of color. As bad as it used to be? No, but racism is still present, and employment is just one of myriad of issues POC still face.