Florida and Texas AGs say they won’t enforce antidiscrimination laws

The chief legal officers of Florida and Texas said they will not enforce state anti-discrimination laws they consider unconstitutional.

Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier issued a 14-page opinion on Martin Luther King Jr. Day targeting more than 80 anti-discrimination measures he described as racist for favoring people of color.

The same day, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton declared the diversity, equity and inclusion programs of state and local governments, and of school districts, as unfair and contrary to the memory of King himself.

“America is waking up to the egregious unfairness of DEI policies. People should be judged based on merit and the quality of their character and qualifications, not their race, sex or any other inherent characteristic conferred at birth,” Paxton said.

Paxton, a Southern Baptist, is currently running for the U.S. Senate in a primary race against Republican incumbent John Corynyn.

Both opinions cited the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2023 ruling in Students for Fair Admissions, Inc. v. President and Fellows of Harvard College, which held that race-based admissions practices violate the Equal Protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.

Uthmeier’s opinion proclaimed Florida statutes recognizing race as a classification in state hiring practices, college financial aid and minority business assistance programs are patently illegal: “Florida laws that mandate race-based discrimination violate the U.S. and Florida Constitutions. Consistent with the Fourteenth Amendment, the Florida Constitution and my oath of office, my studied opinion is that these laws are unconstitutional.”

Among “the most egregious examples,” he said, is a law directing state agencies to develop and participate in affirmative action initiatives, including those aimed at hiring. Such statutes “would not achieve a compelling public interest.”

Laws mandating fairness in government contracting also were targeted in the opinion: “Florida’s discriminatory contracting provisions earmark certain opportunities for minority contractors without providing any ‘strong basis in evidence” to support this race-based action.’”

Black Florida legislators immediately condemned Uthmeier for releasing the document on the King holiday and for seeking to reverse decades of hard-won advances for people of color.

Democratic state Sen. LaVon Bracy Davis of Orlando said the timing felt deliberate, the Orlando Sentinel reported. “With a single document, more than 80 protections built upon decades, nearly half a century of work, were placed on the chopping block.”

Florida House Democratic leader Fentrice Driskell observed the white attorney general “doesn’t have our lived experience, but I wish he would listen when we explain the reality of our lives and what people go through in our communities.”

The laws Uthmeier targeted do not create preferences, as his opinion asserted, but actually shield Black Floridians from discrimination, she added. “This is about leveling the playing field, making sure Floridians who look like us, and Floridians who look like the attorney general, have the same opportunities.”

In Texas, Paxton’s 74-page document caught plenty of flak as well, including for the swipe it took at Cornyn, a former Texas attorney general. The opinion chastises Cornyn for failing to adequately criticize DEI-related financial aid policies in public universities during his 1999 to 2002 stint as attorney general.

“DEI has no place in our republic, and the time for evaluating any candidate, employee or recipient of government largesse based on their skin color or sex has come to an end,” Paxton’s opinion said.

Cornyn shot back by describing the comments aimed at him as politically motivated.

“Was this bogus ‘opinion’ an illegal, in-kind contribution to his campaign? Inquiring minds (and the Federal Election Commission) want to know,” Cornyn said in a social media post. “Abusing his government office for personal and political gain. AGAIN,” he added in another.

In the opinion and in an accompanying statement, Paxton added that private companies maintaining “woke DEI practices” will be exposed to state and federal legal penalties.

“This may come as a news flash to the radicals on the far-left, but our Constitution and the rule of law do not allow woke, race-based favoritism that tears our country apart,” Paxton said. “It’s imperative that all private-sector employers, schools and state and local government entities — based on this legal opinion — immediately abolish any DEI, affirmative action or unconstitutional discrimination programs under their authority.”

But Paxton’s critics said the opinion is not legally binding, The Texas Tribune reported.

“He can’t just declare that this is unconstitutional. He can declare that he thinks it’s unconstitutional, but that doesn’t mean that it is,” Texas political attorney Andrew Cates said.