It’s always nice to have a positive story for a change. A Los Angeles judge has scuttled a law that would force corporations to appoint board members who identify as people of color or members of the LGBTQ community.
Superior Court Judge Terry Green made the ruling on Friday and granted a summary judgment to legal watchdog group Judicial Watch, which had filed a lawsuit to overturn the law, which was passed in 2020.
“This historic California court decision declared unconstitutional one of the most blatant and significant attacks in the modern era on constitutional prohibitions against discrimination,” Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton explained in a statement. “In its ruling today, the court upheld the core American value of equal protection under the law. Judicial Watch’s taxpayer clients are heroes for standing up for civil rights against the Left’s pernicious efforts to undo anti-discrimination protections.”
The law mandated that foreign and domestic companies who have their primary offices in California appoint at least one director from “underrepresented communities” by the conclusion of 2021. California’s governor’s office said:
“The bill defines a director from an underrepresented community as an individual who self-identifies as Black, African American, Hispanic, Latino, Asian, Pacific Islander, Native American, Native Hawaiian, or Alaska Native, or who self-identifies as gay, lesbian, bisexual, or transgender.”
Gov. Gavin Newsom and California Democrats capitalized on the outrage against the murder of George Floyd to pass the measure. He signed the bill in September 2020.
Judicial Watch has also mounted legal challenges against a California law that would require publicly traded companies to appoint at least one woman to their boards of directors.
“Boards with four to nine directors would have been required to have at least two such directors by the end of 2022, while boards with nine or more directors would have needed to have three directors from ‘underrepresented communities,’” according to The Washington Times.
Judicial Watch’s statement noted that “a Senate Floor Analysis produced during deliberation on the legislation concluded the bill draws distinctions based on race and ethnicity, and therefore, it is ‘suspect’ and that ‘the existence of general societal discrimination will not ordinarily satisfy courts.”
Attorneys representing the watchdog group argued:
AB 979 and Defendant’s justifications also plainly “embody stereotypes that treat individuals as the product of their race, [ethnicity, sexual orientation, or transgender status] evaluating their thoughts and efforts—their very worth as citizens—according to [] criterion[s] barred to the Government by history and the Constitution.” In the end, AB 970 is simply a numerical set-aside that amounts to racial, ethnic, and LGBT balancing. ([“Racial balancing is not transformed from ‘patently unconstitutional’ to a compelling state interest simply by relabeling it ‘racial diversity.’”].)
It is a wonder that California’s Democrats even tried to impose such a blatantly unconstitutional law. Of course, we know they care nothing for the Constitution. But even so, would they not have foreseen that a judge, even one in the Golden State, would slap down such a law harder than Will Smith slapped Chris Rock?
Pretty much everyone agrees that companies should not be allowed to disqualify or exclude anyone based on race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, or other traits. But the notion that a government could compel a private organization to specifically hire people of a particular identity was never going to fly. Politicians can’t force a company to hire based on skin color and sexuality any more than they can make them exclude based on these characteristics.
This is yet another problem with the affirmative action approach. When the state forces companies to hire people based on immutable characteristics, they are simply practicing the same type of racism they claim to oppose. It is part of their longstanding strategy of fighting racism with more racism.
It is also worth pointing out that this is yet another reason why we must pay close attention to what progressives are doing when a story like George Floyd’s is elevated to the national stage. These events don’t only serve as a distraction; they are also something the left can use to impose their woke agenda under the guise of supporting underrepresented groups. If we are not vigilant as Judicial Watch was, there is no telling the types of policy these people will foist upon the rest of us.
