California Rep. Ted Lieu on Thursday melted down when a witness at a congressional hearing cited allegations of anti-Asian discrimination at Harvard University.
Lieu, who was making the case that the federal judiciary was biased against Asian Americans, shouted at Peter Kirsanow, a member of the United States Commission on Civil Rights, when he mentioned that one of the foremost examples of anti-Asian discrimination in the United States was at Harvard University, where many future judges attend law school.
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“If there is discrimination, it’s against Asian Americans,” Kirsanow said. “Just yesterday, I filed a brief in the Students for Fair Admissions Harvard case in the Supreme Court.”
“Stop bringing in irrelevant issues!” Lieu shouted, interrupting Kirsanow.
Lieu then launched into a rant in which he accused Kirsanow of bringing up the Harvard case to evade his questions about systemic racism affecting Asian American representation on the federal bench.
“Underrepresented, definitely,” Kirsanow said. “But underrepresented based on the fact that there has been discrimination in the pipeline that we have been talking about. Profound discrimination against Asian Americans. Without question profound discrimination.”
Kirsanow added that the perception of racial discrimination at Harvard contributes to a broader undermining of trust in institutions. He said, especially because Harvard pumps out a disproportionate number of federal judges, the way that it operates matters to the judiciary.
Lieu replied that Kirsanow was avoiding the greater issue that the federal judiciary is majority white.
“It’s corrosive to America to have an entire third branch of government in which people are selected on the basis of them being white,” he said. “That’s the only way to explain these statistics.”
Lieu and Kirsanow’s exchange comes amid a broader partisan disagreement over an anti-Asian discrimination case filed against Harvard. The case, which was appealed to the Supreme Court in February, concerns whether or not the Ivy League school has been weeding out Asian American applicants in its admissions process.
The Trump administration supported the students in the lawsuit. When the Biden administration took over, many legal scholars expected the president would reverse course, especially after doing so in a similar case filed against Yale University.
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Harvard President Lawrence Bacow, in early February, told the Harvard Crimson that he hoped the Biden administration would behave similarly in the case against his school.
“I was pleased when the Justice Department dropped the Yale lawsuit, and I would certainly hope that they would support our position on affirmative action should the case go to the Supreme Court,” Bacow said.
