USA 2024 Elections Thread

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Similar to Democrats newfound corrupt woke gayification agenda...

Was San Francisco Election Official Not Rehired Because He Wasn't
'Diverse' Enough?

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/19171/san-francisco-discrimination

    The City of San Francisco is a state actor that is
constitutionally prohibited from disqualifying job applicants on the
basis of race. That is precisely what occurred here, despite the phony
claim that Arntz can reapply for his job.

    There is one important benefit to the San Francisco decision — at
least as compared to university admissions decisions. The San
Francisco panel did not try to disguise the racial criteria they are
employing, whereas most universities go to great length to deny that
race alone is often a dispositive factor in ranking applicants. This
will make it easier for the courts to hold San Francisco's Arntz
decision as a clear violation of the equal protection clause of the
14th Amendment.

    In the bad old days, race was often used to discriminate against
Black applicants. Today race is often used to discriminate in favor of
Black applicants. I guess that is some sort of progress. But real
progress will be achieved only if and when race is no longer a factor
that trumps meritocracy. Only then will Martin Luther King, Jr.'s
dream of how his children and ours should be judged become a reality.

John Arntz has held the job of San Francisco's director of the
Department of Elections for two decades. He has been repeatedly
praised for his excellent performance at this increasingly important
job — important because of so many election challenges and doubts.
Just two years ago, the election commission commended him for his
"incredible leadership." But now they are essentially firing him
because he is apparently of the wrong race to satisfy their "racial
equity plan."

This is what he was told:

    "Our decision wasn't about your performance, but after twenty
years we wanted to take action on the City's racial equity plan and
give people an opportunity to compete for a leadership position."

The mayor of San Francisco, London Breed, disagreed:

    "John Arntz has served San Francisco with integrity,
professionalism and has stayed completely independent. He's remained
impartial and has avoided getting caught up in the web of City
politics, which is what we are seeing now as a result of this
unnecessary vote.

    "Over the last year John successfully ran four elections while
navigating a pandemic that thwarted San Francisco into crisis response
– all without a single issue. Rather than working on key issues to
recover and rebuilt our City, this is a good example of unfair
politicization of a key part of our government that is working well
for the voters of this city."

All of the 12 managers in his department asked that his contract be
renewed. But in today's woke world of identity politics, race trumps
meritocracy. "Racial equity" plans are apparently more important than
electoral integrity.

It well maybe that Arntz's "equity" replacement will be as good as or
better than him. There are, after all, highly qualified people of all
races and backgrounds. But that is not the point. His contract would
clearly have been renewed — he would not have been fired — if he were
of an "acceptable" race. But he is not, because he does not meet the
criteria for the city's "racial equity plan."

To cover their legal rear ends ("CYA") the panel has said that Arntz
can "reapply" and be considered among the pool of candidates who do
meet the criteria of racial equity, even though he does not! This
"CYA" tactic does not even pass the giggle test.

It certainly does not pass the constitutional test, even the one that
currently allows universities to place the thumb of racial diversity
on the scale of admissions. That test is likely to be changed —
perhaps disallowed — even in the context of private universities such
as Harvard. The City of San Francisco is a state actor that is
constitutionally prohibited from disqualifying job applicants on the
basis of race. That is precisely what occurred here, despite the phony
claim that he can reapply for his job.

There is one important benefit to the San Francisco decision — at
least as compared to university admissions decisions. The San
Francisco panel did not try to disguise the racial criteria they are
employing, whereas most universities go to great length to deny that
race alone is often a dispositive factor in ranking applicants. This
will make it easier for the courts to hold San Francisco's Arntz
decision as a clear violation of the equal protection clause of the
14th Amendment. But even if this particularly outrageous decision is
struck down as unconstitutional, many cities and other governmental
units will continue to use race as a basis for hiring and firing
employees. They will simply be less transparent about it than San
Francisco was.

In the bad old days, race was often used to discriminate against Black
applicants. Today race is often used to discriminate in favor of Black
applicants. I guess that is some sort of progress. But real progress
will be achieved only if and when race is no longer a factor that
trumps meritocracy. Only then will Martin Luther King, Jr.'s dream of
how his children and ours should be judged become a reality.