Naval Academy Promises To ‘Permanently’ End Race-Based Admissions

The Justice Department confirmed Monday that the United States Naval Academy would no longer consider race in admissions, according to a court document. 

In a joint filing with Students for Fair Admission, the Trump administration asked a federal appeals court to dismiss a lawsuit against the academy over a policy that allowed it to consider race during the admissions process. Students for Fair Admission, which sued the academy in October 2023, agreed that the suit was no longer needed due to policy changes implemented by the Trump administration. 

“This Department is committed to ending illegal discrimination and restoring merit-based opportunity throughout the federal government,” said Attorney General Pamela Bondi. “We are proud to partner with the Department of Defense to permanently end race-based admissions at the United States Naval Academy and ensure that admission to this prestigious institution is based exclusively on merit.”

The filing states that the lawsuit is now moot due to the policy change and asks that the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit dismiss a lower court’s ruling that kept race-based admissions in place. The policy allowed the academy to “consider race or ethnicity as one of many nondeterminative factors” for admission. 

This policy ended after President Donald Trump signed an executive order on January 27 that said that no one within the military should be given any advantage based on gender or race. 

In compliance with that order, Naval Academy Superintendent Vice Admiral Yvette Davids issued a memo in February saying that “at no point during the admissions process (including qualification and acceptance) should race, ethnicity, or sex be a factor for admission.”

The joint filing said that considering race and ethnicity for admissions does not contribute to military cohesiveness, lethality, recruitment, or national security. 

“It is the military judgment of the Department of Defense that recruiting and promoting individuals based on merit alone, and not based on their immutable characteristics, improves unit cohesion and performance,” the joint filing said. “The Department of Defense has now determined that neither the recruitment and retention of talented officers nor the legitimacy of the U.S. military are positively affected by the service academies’ consideration of race in admissions.”

Students for Fair Admission was the organization behind the landmark case where the Supreme Court ruled that affirmative action in higher education was unconstitutional and racially discriminatory.