Both cases have been spearheaded by activist Edward Blum, who created Students for Fair Admissions (SFFA), an organization that represents “more than 20,000 students, parents, and others who believe that racial classifications and preferences in college admissions are unfair”. As the plaintiff in both cases, SFFA argues that, by considering race in their admissions, Harvard and UNC-Chapel Hill are discriminating against certain applicants, such as Asian American people. This, the group says, violates a clause in the Fourteenth Amendment of the US Constitution prohibiting states from denying anyone equal protection of the law, as well as the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
Harvard and UNC-Chapel Hill, however, argue that affirmative action has helped them to even out the playing field for Black and Hispanic students who have not had the same educational opportunities as others because of systemic racism in the United States.