Articles

Caltrans is violating both Proposition 209 and the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Its quota program also raises costs and squanders tax money, because bureaucrats award contracts based on race or sex, instead of awarding contracts to the lowest responsible bidder. … ...

PLF lauds Ricci ruling, which can help PLF’s current lawsuits against San Francisco and Caltrans public-works contracting quotas The Supreme Court ruled Monday that New Haven, CT. violated federal civil rights law when it scrapped the results of a firefighters promotional exam because the top scorers did not meet the city’s preferred ra ...

Tonight, on KOGO, am 600 (San Diego’s leading am radio station), PLF Attorney Ralph W. Kasarda will discuss PLF’s challenge to the race- and sex-based quotas that the California Department of Transportation (Caltrans) employs in contracts for federally funded road and highway projects. Kasarda is scheduled to join host Chris Reed, on KO ...

Stop me if you heard this one before.   How did the shrub cross the road?  By calling CalTrans, US Fish & Wildlife, California Department of Fish & Game, the Wild Equity Institute, the Center for Bilogical Diversity, the California Native Plant Society, and spending $205,000 tax dollars. When the Endangered Species Act meets big governm ...

Following Obama’s victory last week, Ilya Somin of the Volokh Conspiracy wrote that “it’s certainly a sign that racism has greatly declined, and that African-Americans are more fully accepted in mainstream American society than ever before.”  There is a certain kernel of truth in that statement.  Having a black American as ...

Environment — Clean Water Act We filed our complaint on behalf of Peter and Frankie Smith against the Army Corps of Engineers.  At issue is whether a mostly dry arroyo, 25 miles from the Rio Grande, is a water of the United States.  After acquiring the property, Peter Smith began to clean out years of accumulated waste … ...

Today we remember the perseverance, passion, and dream of one our nation’s greatest advocates for liberty and equality under the law: Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.  He fought tirelessly to end segregation and discrimination, and changed the course of history in the process. In his famous, “I Have a Dream” speech during the March on ...

Earlier this week I participated in oral argument before the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals for our case in Associated General Contractors of America, San Diego Chapter v. California Department of Transportation (Caltrans).  As a condition of taking federal highway funds, Caltrans administers a federal contracting program called the Disadvantaged ...

In my last post about our case Associated General Contractors of America, San Diego Chapter  v. California Department of Transportation (Caltrans), I described how Caltrans implements the federal Disadvantaged Business Enterprise (DBE) program in a way that requires prime contractors to discriminate against subcontractors on the basis of race and ...