The Department of Justice on Thursday announced investigations into 15 U.S. medical schools over allegations that the admissions programs illegally used applicants’ race as a metric.
The report does not specify which schools are under investigation or provide specific evidence of racial discrimination. The DOJ said it opened the investigations to ensure compliance with federal law.
The medical schools will be examined under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act, as interpreted by the Supreme Court’s decision in Students for Fair Admissions v. President and Fellows of Harvard College.
The landmark 2023 decision ruled that race-based admissions programs at Harvard College and the University of North Carolina directly violated federal law by discriminating against white and Asian applications in favor of other racial identities, in direct violation of the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment.
“Many of America’s top medical schools appear more concerned about the demographics of their incoming classes than training students to succeed in the profession,” said Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon of the DOJ’s Civil Rights Division in the released announcement.
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“Under this Justice Department, we will continue to protect American students from discriminatory and illegal preferences in admissions — especially in professions as critical as medicine, where quality of training should be the top priority,” she added.
These new investigations come after the DOJ determined in May that both the University of California, Los Angeles, and Yale University are guilty of illegally and intentionally selecting medical school applicants based on race. The Trump administration has prioritized efforts to reform higher education due to allegations of institutional racial and political bias, free speech violations, and antisemitism.