The populist surge needs to go further: the elites who claim to represent minorities are too often working against their needs. Take the issues of school choice and affirmative action. African Americans, Asians and Hispanics favor the former but oppose application of the latter; in general, their leaders oppose the former and favor the latter.
The National Urban League, the NAACP and the National Action Network are all opposed to school choice and charter schools. Marc Morial, president of the Urban League, says school vouchers “would be devastating to black kids.” The NAACP called for a moratorium on new charter schools in 2016. And the Rev. Al Sharpton, founder and president of the National Action Network, claims charter schools have a racist history.
The black elite badly misrepresent their people. No demographic group is more gung-ho for school choice than African Americans. Fully 73 percent want the right to send their child to the school of their choice. They are also demanding that their public officials provide more money for charter schools.
These same three black civil rights organizations are also pro-affirmative action. When asked a generic question about affirmative action—“Is it a good thing?”—61 percent of blacks agree that it is, but when it is applied to a specific subject, the results are different. For example, 71 percent of blacks say colleges should not consider race or ethnicity when deciding which students to accept.
The National Council of Asian Pacific Americans (NCAPA) is a coalition of 38 national organizations. It has plenty to say about education, but it is noticeably silent on school choice and charter schools, owing, no doubt, to the fact that Asians favor both. Indeed, 70 percent of Asians want school choice, and in big metropolitan areas, they are in the forefront of the pro-charter school movement. NCAPA strongly supports affirmative action, and while 53 percent of Asians say that it is a good thing in general, 76 percent say it should not be a deciding factor in school admissions criteria.
There are two Hispanic civil rights organizations that claim to speak for their people, the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC) and UnidosUS (formerly National Center of La Raza).
Not too long ago they wanted to drop the terms Latino and Latina in referring to Hispanic men and women, respectively, favoring instead the sex-neutral term, Latinx. But due to the backlash from their own people, LULAC dropped the term from its communications in 2021 and UnidosUS only sparingly invokes its, such as when referring to LGBTQ Latinx.
There is a reason for this: only 2 percent of Hispanics like Latinx—they are quite comfortable being identified as a man or a woman.
LULAC is opposed to school choice but favors charter schools. UnidosUS is agnostic on school choice but is also supportive of charter schools. By contrast, 71 percent of Hispanics want school choice (they also favor charter schools). LULAC and UnidosUS support affirmative action, but only 36 percent of Hispanics say it is a good thing in general; 81 percent are opposed to it being a factor in deciding which students to admit.
It is striking how much influence the big donor class has on these civil rights groups. Black, Asian and Hispanic organizations had better bow to their left-wing demands or they will be cut off lickety split. So even if it means selling out their own people, the leading spokesmen are prepared to do so.
It is not white supremacists who are working against the educational interests of minorities—it is the leaders in their own community. They are a national disgrace.
