Tipsheet

What Caused a CNN Host to Quickly End Her Segment on Affirmative Action

Matt Vespa
Matt Vespa  |  June 30, 2023 11:42 PM

Liberal America is going apoplectic over the recent Supreme Court ruling that ruled affirmative action policies for college admissions. Reactions have ranged from Justice Clarence Thomas being evil to ‘this is the end of higher education for women,’ even though women dominate college campuses. The Left was all about ‘stop Asian hate,’ and now they’re turning their fire on Asian families who are primarily against these policies.

CNN reporter and anchor Abby Phillip’s segment on this subject unexpectedly ended once facts were presented by Kenny Xu of Students for Fair Admissions. We all know why that happened, folks (via The Blaze):

CNN host Abby Phillip ended a segment with a fair admissions advocate on Thursday when he used facts to demonstrate the downside of affirmative action. 

Kenny Xu — a board member for Students for Fair Admissions, the plaintiff in the Supreme Court case — told Phillip that academic excellence, not race, "should be prioritized" in college admissions. 

"I think that admissions should be only based on merit," he said. "Why are we asking a university to calculate somebody's level of diversity? I think that sets a very bad precedent for anybody trying to get into college. We should be treated on the basis of our merits. We should be treated on the basis of how hard we work, or study, our SAT scores, our grades." 

But Phillip pushed back. She asked why admissions boards should not consider "other factors" that students "bring to the table" like socio-economic background. 

Xu argued you cannot do that fairly because, inevitably, admissions standards are changed for applicants from a disadvantaged socio-economic background versus applicants from a privileged background. 

"We don't want that. We want black students to succeed. We want every student to succeed, low-income students to succeed," he pointed out. "But you have to put them in scenarios, in places where they are likely to succeed. And lowering your standard to admit somebody of a socio-economic status or race would not help you do that. In fact, you would harm their graduation rate and excellence." 

When Phillip tried to say the standards weren’t lowered, Xu whipped out data on SAT scores and admission rates, and the CNN host quickly fled to the bunker. Xu is right. Thomas Sowell explained this glaring problem with affirmative action in front of a US Senate committee, adding that these protocols often set up these applicants for failure. 


The actual data will get lost in the noise because the Left will now turn to their favorite pastime: beating up the Supreme Court. The Left’s vitriol toward our third branch will reach a fever pitch in the next few days. Liberals loved the Court until their heroes, like Ruth Bader Ginsburg, either died or retired. Ginsburg received some grave stomping, as her retirement under Obama could have led to a younger liberal jurist replacing her seat. Instead, she refused to step down, passed away, and conservative Justice Amy Coney Barrett sits there. 

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The Left thinks SCOTUS should be subjected to the court of public opinion. Judicial review isn’t an electoral process. They’re supposed to be isolated from the noise. That’s for Congress and the legislatures to deal with cyclically. Yet, after using the courts to push their agenda, you can see why the Left would wrongly think this is another legislative battlefield.