President Joe Biden recently taunted Republicans who had rejected his $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan Act by pointing out how they were showcasing its benefits for the folks back home.
“I’m not going to embarrass any one of them, but I have here a list of how back in their districts they’re bragging about the Rescue Plan,” Biden said during a visit to Ohio last week, in which he claimed to have a roster of 13 GOP hypocritical lawmakers, according to Politico.
“I mean, some people have no shame. But I’m happy they know that it benefited their constituents,” he said as the crowd laughed.
Republicans, in retort, may want to start showing constituents a federal court ruling that struck down part of Biden’s plan for being unconstitutional and racist.
The Free Press reported in early May that the U.S. Small Business Administration had released criteria for business owners seeking COVID relief through the Restaurant Revitalization Fund, which was part of the American Rescue Plan.
The SBA noted that the $29 billion fund was created “to provide funding to help restaurants and other eligible businesses keep their doors open.”
The agency created a process that prioritized funding for any small business that is “at least 51 percent owned by one or more individuals” who are women, followed by veterans, and then the “socially and economically disadvantaged.”
The SBA defined “socially disadvantaged” as those who have been subjected to “racial or ethnic prejudice or cultural bias because of their identity as a member of a group without regard to their individual qualities.”
In its actual program application, that category was further defined as people who “are presumed to be socially disadvantaged: Black Americans; Hispanic Americans; Native Americans (including Alaska Natives and Native Hawaiians); Asian Pacific Americans; or Subcontinent Asian Americans.”
The ”economically disadvantaged” were more or less the same groups.
In short, White men, who were not veterans, were shoved to the back of the line.
On Thursday, however, a federal appellate court said the Biden administration’s rules amounted to systemic racism.
In a 2-1 opinion, written by Judge Amul Thapar, the federal appellate court in Knoxville, Tennessee, noted, “This case is about whether the government can allocate limited coronavirus relief funds based on the race and sex of the applicants. We hold that it cannot. Thus, we enjoin the government from using these unconstitutional criteria.”
Unconstitutional because the SBA “has injected explicit racial and ethnic preferences into the priority process.”
Restaurant owner Antonio Vitolo had sued, noting that he was shut out of the program, even though his wife is Hispanic, because they each own 50 percent of the business.
The court pointed out that Vitolo filed his application on May 3, yet those who meet the SBA’s priority criteria could still file three weeks after he did and likely be approved and funded. By the time the SBA got to Vitolo, the well could be dry.
“There is an obvious solution to this of course,” Judge Thapar wrote. “The agency can simply fund grants in the order they were received — without regard to priority status, and without regard to the processing head start that many applications received on the basis of race and sex.”
The judge also pointed out how the Biden administration’s race-baiting was an epic fail.
“The government offers little evidence of past intentional discrimination against the many groups to whom it grants preferences,” Thapar wrote.
“Indeed, the schedule of racial preferences detailed in the government’s regulation — preferences for Pakistanis but not Afghans; Japanese but not Iraqis; Hispanics but not Middle Easterners — is not supported by any record evidence at all.”
That made even less sense in this particular case, the majority said.
“Indeed, the restaurant at issue, Jake’s Bar, is 50% owned by a Hispanic female. It is far from obvious why that 1% difference in ownership is relevant,” Judge Thapar added.
In closing, Thapar pointed out that the U.S. Supreme Court in two cases going back two decades had struck down race-based preferences.
“As today’s case shows once again, the ‘way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race,’” he wrote.
The majority ordered the SBA to fund Vitolo’s application before any that came after it, although the court said veterans still may be considered for a priority preference.
This may not be the last assault on Biden’s racist, anti-White tendencies.
As The Free Press recently reported, a group of White farmers from Wisconsin, Minnesota, South Dakota, and Ohio have sued the Department of Agriculture because Biden’s massive stimulus plan set up $4 billion to forgive loans for “socially disadvantaged farmers and ranchers,” defined as those who are black, American Indian, Hispanic, Alaskan native, Asian American or Pacific Islander.
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