Elite Law School Nailed For Discrimination

President Trump’s Justice Department says Duke University School of Law broke federal civil rights law by using race in admissions for three incoming classes.

Quick Take

The Justice Department says Duke Law discriminated against applicants in the 2023, 2024, and 2025 incoming classes.
Federal investigators say the school used race-linked essays and other signals to shape admissions outcomes.
The department says Black and Hispanic applicants were admitted at higher rates than White and Asian applicants with similar records.
The case adds to a larger fight over whether elite schools have really stopped using race after the Supreme Court’s 2023 ruling.

What the Justice Department Found

The Civil Rights Division said its review found that Duke Law “violated” Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Supreme Court’s 2023 ruling in Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard. The department said Duke Law intentionally discriminated on the basis of race in granting and denying admission to the 2023, 2024, and 2025 incoming classes. It also said the school kept pursuing race-based outcomes after the Supreme Court barred racial preferences in higher education.

The findings letter says the department reviewed Duke Law documents and applicant data before reaching its conclusion. The letter says the school discriminated against “other applicants” to benefit applicants from preferred racial groups, and that highly qualified White, Asian, and other students were denied admission because of race. Reuters reported in 2025 that the Trump administration had already opened an investigation into Duke University and the Duke Law Journal, showing this fight had been building for more than a year before the latest action.

How Officials Say the System Worked

Justice Department officials said Duke Law used diversity-focused essay questions and applicant tags tied to race-correlated traits to preserve racial preferences. Fox News reported that investigators found Black applicants in 2025 had roughly 3.5 times the chance of admission as Asian applicants with similar academic credentials. The same reporting said the median Law School Admission Test score for accepted Black applicants was lower than the median score for rejected Asian and White applicants.

The department also said the pattern was not limited to one year. Its letter says applicant-level data from 2018 through 2025 showed “substantial and persistent racial preferences” in admissions, and that the differences were durable enough to support a finding of intentional discrimination. That kind of language matters because civil rights cases often turn on whether a school can show a neutral process or whether race kept shaping results behind the scenes.

Why This Case Reaches Beyond Duke

The Duke Law finding fits a broader crackdown on elite schools after Students for Fair Admissions. The U.S. Department of Education separately opened an investigation into Duke University and the Duke Law Journal over alleged race-based selection of journal members, and it said senior administration officials sent Duke a joint letter about race preferences in hiring, admissions, and scholarships. That shows federal scrutiny is now moving across more parts of the university, not just the admissions office.

Justice Department cites Duke Law for discrimination based on race in admissions https://t.co/5z6clNHIIM

— John Solomon (@jsolomonReports) August 8, 2026

For families watching higher education, the case raises a familiar question: are the country’s most selective schools following the law, or finding new ways around it? Supporters of strict race-neutral admissions see the Duke case as proof that old habits did not end with the Supreme Court ruling. Critics of the crackdown will argue that schools still want diversity and that the federal government is pushing too hard. Either way, the dispute lands at the center of a wider trust problem in elite institutions.

What Happens Next

The Justice Department said it will seek a voluntary resolution agreement with Duke University to bring admissions into compliance. If that fails, the department said it will file suit. Duke said it was reviewing the findings and would continue to comply with the law in a way that matches its academic mission. That leaves the school with a hard choice: defend its process, negotiate with federal officials, or change admissions practices in a way that could reshape how it defines merit.