FILE PHOTO: People walk on campus at Columbia University in New York City, U.S., April 8, 2025. REUTERS/Ryan Murphy/File Photo
(Reuters) -U.S. President Donald Trump on Thursday signed a memorandum that requires universities to collect admissions data to prove they are not engaged in efforts to shape their student bodies along racial lines, according to the White House.
But the largest higher education policy and lobbying organization in the U.S. said the wording of the memo was vague and it may be illegal for schools to collect the data on race that the White House seeks.
The move is the latest effort in the Trump administration's effort to dismantle affirmative action policies at universities. It has launched dozens of investigations and threatened to cut off funding to schools that promote diversity, equity and inclusion programs.
According to the memorandum, a 2023 U.S. Supreme Court ruling knocked down the use of affirmative action in college admissions, but universities have been getting around the decision because of a lack of admissions data and by relying on "diversity statements" students provide in applying that indicate their race.
The U.S. Department of Education said in a statement that Education Secretary Linda McMahon had directed the National Center for Education Statistics to now collect from universities data on the race and gender of their applicant pool, on the students admitted and of all enrolled undergraduates.
But Jonathan Fansmith, senior vice president at the American Council on Education, a higher education lobbying and advocacy organization with 1,600 member schools, said collecting such data was illegal under the very Supreme Court ruling that ended affirmative action.
"You can't consider race in admissions, so schools don't collect data on race from applicants," Fansmith said. "This seems to be an effort to get institutions to provide information that we don't have and that we can't collect."
The White House and the Department of Education did not immediately respond to a request for comment about Fansmith's assertion that collecting the data would be illegal.
(Reporting by Brad Brooks in Colorado; Additional reporting by Brendan O'Brien in Chicago, Kanishka Singh and Jasper Ward in Washington, and Christian Martinez in Los Angeles; Editing by Caitlin Webber, Franklin Paul and Daniel Wallis)
