California Legislature Votes to Allow Discrimination by Race, Gender, National Origin

This week, the legislature in California voted to remove the constitutional prohibition on “discriminating against or granting preferential treatment to persons on the basis of race, sex, color, ethnicity, or national origin in public employment, public education, and public contracting.” That’s right, California just voted to allow racial and gender discrimination in all its public activities. The bill will move to the ballot in November for a popular vote.

The measure, ACA5, repeals section 31 of Article 1 of the California Constitution. The strikethrough language below is what’s being removed—and this is a really bad look:

(a) The State shall not discriminate against, or grant preferential treatment to, any individual or group on the basis of race, sex, color, ethnicity, or national origin in the operation of public employment, public education, or public contracting.

(b) This section shall apply only to action taken after the section’s effective date.

(c) Nothing in this section shall be interpreted as prohibiting bona fide qualifications based on sex which are reasonably necessary to the normal operation of public employment, public education, or public contracting.

(d) Nothing in this section shall be interpreted as invalidating any court order or consent decree which is in force as of the effective date of this section.

(e) Nothing in this section shall be interpreted as prohibiting action which must be taken to establish or maintain eligibility for any federal program, where ineligibility would result in a loss of federal funds to the State.

(f) For the purposes of this section, “State” shall include, but not necessarily be limited to, the State itself, any city, county, city and county, public university system, including the University of California, community college district, school district, special district, or any other political subdivision or governmental instrumentality of or within the State.

(g) The remedies available for violations of this section shall be the same, regardless of the injured party’s race, sex, color, ethnicity, or national origin, as are otherwise available for violations of then-existing California antidiscrimination law.

(h) This section shall be self-executing. If any part or parts of this section are found to be in conflict with federal law or the United States Constitution, the section shall be implemented to the maximum extent that federal law and the United States Constitution permit. Any provision held invalid shall be severable from the remaining portions of this section.

The proponents of the bill, the most radical progressives in California (which is really saying something), say it’s about removing the ban on affirmative action, first passed in 1996. The University of California Board of Regents, headed by Janet Napolitano, supports this bill. Many have absurdly cited the CCP coronavirus pandemic and the murder of George Floyd at the hands of the Minneapolis Police Department to say the era of affirmative action should end. Opponents call it nothing more than a racial spoils system designed to grant preferential treatment to some communities of color over others…………

Yet, that’s where we are in 2020. We’re repealing non-discrimination portions of state constitutions in order to appease the woke mob and the BLM crowds. Little wonder, when too many don’t understand their own history enough to realize why we decided discrimination was a bad thing long ago, and decided as a people to put it into our foundational documents. In the 2020 landscape of race riots and pandemic lockdowns, history doesn’t matter, and the mob will be appeased.