Racial Discrimination Lawsuits against Four Universities Filed by Asians
Universities’ Discrimination against Asians Reached Absurd Levels
My son Stanley and I just filed lawsuits against the University of California (UC), the University of Washington (UW), the University of Michigan (UM), and Cornell.
In short, at age 18, co-plaintiff Stanley Zhong was hired by Google for a PhD-level position after being rejected by 16 colleges for undergraduate admission. His college application story was cited in a congressional hearing in September 2023. We attempted to engage with university officials, state lawmakers, Governor Newsom, and the federal Department of Education, but after being stonewalled or ignored for well over a year, litigation became our only remaining option. More details on Stanley's achievements as a high schooler—including his 1590 SAT score without much preparation, e-signing startup featured by Amazon Web Services, advancement to the Google Code Jam and Facebook Hacker Cup semifinals, 2nd place finish in the MIT Battlecode, and highest-level Presidential Volunteer Service Award—are outlined in Section A1 in our legal complaint, submitted under penalty of perjury.
In addition to Stanley’s specific case, our complaint highlights the abnormality in Asian enrollment trends at the University of California.
According to the 2020 U.S. Census, California’s Asian population grew by 25% over the prior decade, making it the fastest-growing ethnic group in the state (See Exhibit 70). However, Asian student representation at UC declined from 38% in 2002 to 32% in 2022, with a general decline in Chinese American enrollment between 2018 and 2024 (See Exhibits 71 and Exhibit 72). At UC Berkeley, one of the most selective campuses of the UC system, Asian admits trended significantly downward in recent years. The percentage of Asian applicants admitted by UC Berkeley went from 18.9% (3,188 out of 16,866) in 2014 to 15.8% (4,416 out of 27,875) in 2023. (See Exhibit 73. 2023 is the latest year for which the data is publicly available.)
Even with the limited public data available, we can easily infer substantial SAT score disparities. For example, our complaint against Cornell presents an analysis that shows Asian-American applicants face significantly higher SAT score thresholds for admission compared to other racial groups.
In 2023, the year Stanley applied in, Cornell enrolled 214 African American students. The 25th percentile SAT scores for Cornell students was 1420 (See Exhibit 64 as well). Nationally, 225,954 African American students took the SAT in 2023, with approximately 1% (roughly 2,259 students) scoring in the 1400–1600 range (See Exhibit 65). If Cornell’s African American enrollees reflected the general SAT distribution of Cornell students, approximately 161 (214*75%) of them would have scored above the 25th percentile of 1420, with an even larger number exceeding 1400. This would mean Cornell enrolled about 7.1% (161/2259) of the nation’s top African American SAT performers.
Using this analysis, the estimated percentage of national top scorers enrolled at Cornell is approximately 7.1% for African Americans, 1.0% for Asian Americans, 4.1% for Hispanic Americans, and 1.9% for White students (See Exhibit 66).
Given the geographic distribution of high-achieving students, such a high concentration of top scorers from certain racial groups appears statistically improbable. These figures suggest that Asian-American applicants face significantly higher SAT score thresholds for admission compared to other racial groups. While SAT scores are not the sole measure of merit, this statistical irregularity raises serious concerns about whether Cornell’s admissions policies comply with constitutional and legal prohibitions or limits against racial preferences.
Additionally, our complaints documented concrete instances of universities prioritizing race over academic merit in faculty hiring while concealing it, in clear violation of federal and state laws. The video of the UC Berkeley Law School dean, Mr. Erwin Chemerinsky, is an egregious example. He described and preached the “unstated Affirmative Action” practiced at UC as follows: “Don’t say that [you are considering the candidate’s race]. You can think it. You can vote it… Don’t ever articulate that is what you are doing.” He also said "If I'm ever deposed, I'm going to deny I said this to you."
With Asian plaintiffs leading the charge in these four lawsuits, I hope we can move the national conversation about racial preferences in college admissions to a more rational and facts-based stage. For starters, I suggest we use the term racial preference instead of Affirmative Action because the latter means different things to different people. Yet many people use these two terms interchangeably, perhaps intentionally to muddle the discussions. Let’s not fall for that trap. In pursuit of rational and honest discussions, I sent public debate challenges to every vocal Harvard supporter I could find in the SFFA case—thus far, none have responded over the past year. I will keep trying. Ultimately, our goal is to win in not only the court of law but also the court of public opinion.
AI, the Game Changer
For highly politicized lawsuits like ours, the lawyers leaning left don’t want to take them, and the lawyers on the right think that the courts in California are too biased for us to possibly win. So we are forced to represent ourselves.
Our 'legal team' consists of ChatGPT and Gemini. They did a fantastic job of drafting the legal complaints. For $20 a month, 24/7 access, and no conflict of interest to worry about, we can hardly expect more! When the lawyer of one of the universities objected to the scope of our litigation hold notice, our AI-drafted response compelled them to back down and fully comply with our document retention request.
Furthermore, we are developing a trial preparation tool named TrialGPT. It would run trial simulations where different AI agents take the roles of the plaintiff, defendant, judge, jury, witness, etc. The goal is to find the optimal litigation strategy (e.g. Arlington Heights framework vs. McDonnell-Douglas framework), anticipate the defence moves, and maximize our win rate.
As pro se litigants with no legal background, our battle against well-resourced universities and their top legal teams is undeniably a David vs. Goliath fight. AI may just be the sling we need.
AI-Guided Legal Strategy for Our Lawsuits
Our discussions with AI led to the formulation of the following principles.
Start with the low hanging fruit
The federal Department of Education administers Minority Serving Institution (MSI) grant programs with eligibility criteria based on specific racial enrollment thresholds. For example, the Hispanic-Serving Institution (HSI) Program mandates at least 25% Hispanic enrollment. Our AI-assisted legal analysis strongly suggests that such race-based requirements are unconstitutional. If the court concurs, the University of California’s pursuit of HSI status—and its corresponding 25% Hispanic enrollment target—would place its admissions policies on legally precarious ground.
Leverage state laws
Stanley applied just before the Supreme Court’s 2023 ruling in SFFA v. Harvard. However, California, Washington, and Michigan have each had state laws prohibiting racial preference or discrimination in public education since 1996, 1998, and 2006, respectively. UC, UW, and UM have all faced past lawsuits over racial discrimination, including Bakke and Grutter at the Supreme Court. Bringing them to court again holds significant symbolic weight and far-reaching national implications.
Leverage recent court rulings
Cornell falls under the jurisdiction of the Second Circuit Court of Appeals, whose 2024 decision in Chinese American Citizens Alliance of Greater New York (CACAGNY) v. Adams strongly supports our case. The ruling affirmed that a facially neutral policy driven by racial motives violates equal protection, even if aggregate enrollment improves. It explicitly states that “if discriminatory intent is proven, a negative effect or harm from that discriminatory policy on individual Asian-American students applying to the SHSs [Specialized High Schools] would be sufficient to trigger strict scrutiny review.”
Bring it to the Supreme Court
UC, UW, UM, and Cornell fall under three different circuit courts. If we secure victories in some cases while facing losses in others—creating a potential circuit split—it would significantly increase the likelihood of the Supreme Court granting certiorari to resolve the conflicting rulings.
You Can Help
While we have whistleblower reports regarding the secret use of race at each of the universities sued, we are actively collecting more for both student admissions and faculty hiring, whether anonymous or not. If you have any leads or comments, please email me at nanzhong1@gmail.com. For more background info, please visit our website.
 | A guest post by
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Dear Nan,
As a Cornell professor, i wish you success in your lawsuit. I also hope that your lasuit has a positive influence on us so that we will accept people based on merit. Only then will people truly understand what a Cornell degree means.
Thanks for writing this.
Randy
I was a faculty member at UC Berkeley from 1999 to 2015 and I sat on many committees to hire new faculty and to admit graduate students and postdoctoral fellows.
The policies for hiring were influenced by DEI and the Title IX offices. The annual budget for DEI Programs at UC Berkeley was $25 Million. The funds came mostly from "overhead" on Federal grants. The DEI Website: https:/diversity.berkeley.edu/programs-services
UC Berkeley enforced many DEI programs that favor students and faculty based on the color of their skin or their gender. DEI at Berkeley strongly influences policies, admissions, hiring, course content, and disciplinary actions, resulting in favoritism and discrimination toward certain groups based on race and gender.
Humanities courses at Berkeley are especially infused with these biases, emphasizing the oppression by whites, males, and the U.S.. After taking such courses, white male undergraduates reported feeling pressured to identify, spuriously, as "gender fluid" during class discussions to soften the presumption that they are oppressors, privileged, toxic, and colonizers, due to their white skin and male gender. Claiming to be gender fluid conferred them with a modicum of victimhood.
Between 2020 and 2025, Applications for faculty positions at UC Berkeley, and for faculty promotions, were required to include a "DEI Statement". Faculty candidates who stated they were "against racism" or that they would "treat everyone equally" were rejected as failing to pass the DEI filter. Instead, applicants must have claimed they are actively "anti-racist”. This means actively giving higher grades to students having dark skin and giving extra help to females. The Biology Department at UC Berkeley led this policy.
Faculty hiring at UC Berkeley was covertly biased toward hiring women and people of color between 2000 to 2025. The faculty hiring bias was always hidden. To avoid obviously violating both the U.S. Civil Rights Act and California Laws, a dean or Vice Chancellor at Berkeley would enter the room where the faculty hiring committee was meeting. After closing the door, the dean or vice chancellor would privately tell the faculty committee members that the successful applicant must be a "person of color" or a female. Some admonitions were conditional. The dean would state that if the top-ranked candidate were male or white, we could hire them only if a female or person of color were also hired as a second faculty member.
As a faculty member at Berkeley, I participated in many hiring committees where such secret illegal demands were made by a dean or Vice Chancellor. I complied, breaking the law. Most tenured faculty eventually sit on faculty hiring committees at UC Berkeley. We all committed this crime, violating the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
Every year, the hidden machinery of Berkeley DEI and Title IX Offices damaged lives after a complaint was filed, with no due process allowed nor the American judicial system.
Overwhelmingly, White and male students were the ones punished or expelled. But those numbers remain hidden, so the bias in punishment against whites, asians, and males is not recorded.