Here We Go Again! Conservative Group Claims Los Angeles School System Desegregation Policy Discriminates Against White Students

The 1776 Project Foundation believes the dated policies "are racially discriminatory in their purpose and effect."

Conservative group 1776 Project Foundation is back, and this time it is suing the Los Angeles Unified School District over claims that its desegregation policy— dating back decades—pushes discrimination against white students, USA Today reports.

The Jan. 20 lawsuit argues students at “non-PHBAO”—meaning predominantly Hispanic, Black, Asian, or “other Non-Anglo”—schools receive “inferior treatment and calculated disadvantages.” The group, whose corresponding PAC was behind the nationwide campaign attempting to oust school board members they felt were in favor of racial and social justice lessons, alleges LAUSD programs “are racially discriminatory in their purpose and effect.”

It also alleges Middle Eastern students are classified as white by the school district and should be “part of the disfavored group, as are others who fall on the wrong side of the District’s bizarre racial and ethnic line-drawing.”

While the Los Angeles school district remains one of the most segregated in the country, according to the New York Times, group founder and conservative political consultant Ryan James Girdusky labels the policy as “the most blatant example of racial discrimination by a major school district in this country.”

The policy in question dates back to the 1970s, when a court order pushed the district to desegregate in an effort to improve conditions for students of color with smaller class sizes, in addition to other benefits for students at schools where enrollment was predominantly PHBAO. Schools that fall under the acronym category are a result of their resident student population. If a school is located in an area with more than 70% Hispanic, Black, Asian, or other, it is designated as PHBAO.

The policy came about as a way to address the “harms of segregation” such as low academic achievement and self-esteem, lack of access to post-secondary opportunities, interracial hostility and intolerance, and overcrowded conditions. But now that is potentially at risk.

The suit comes as the Trump administration war on diversity, equity, and inclusion continues.

As agencies like the Department of Defense scrubbed websites and archives of remnants of Black history and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) chair hypes white men to file workplace discrimination claims, affirmative action expert and Yale Law School professor Justin Driver says America is living in “an era of racial revanchism” following the 2023 controversial Supreme Court ruling to overturn affirmative action.

“Los Angeles Unified remains firmly committed to ensuring all students have meaningful access to services and enriching educational opportunities,” a district spokesperson said. But 1776 Project president,Aiden Buzzetti feels the court order isn’t “relevant anymore to the present day, and it is currently inflicting present-day harms.”