Judicial Watch Sues California to Prevent Enforcement of Race, Ethnicity, Sexual ....

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Judicial Watch Sues California to Prevent Enforcement of Race,
Ethnicity, Sexual Preference and Transgender Status Quotas for
Corporate Boards of Directors




OCTOBER 05, 2020
|
JUDICIAL WATCH


(Washington, DC) – Judicial Watch announced today that it filed a
lawsuit in the Superior Court of the State of California County of
Los Angeles on behalf of three California taxpayers to prevent
California from enforcing Assembly Bill 979 (AB 979), which
Governor Gavin Newsom signed into law September 30, 2020.
The bill requires that boards of directors of California-based,
publicly held domestic or foreign corporations satisfy racial,
ethnicity, sexual preference and transgender status quotas by
the end of the 2021 calendar year. A Senate Floor Analysis says
the bill draws distinctions based on race and ethnicity, and
therefore, it is “suspect,” and that “the existence of general
societal discrimination will not ordinarily satisfy courts.”
Judicial Watch filed a lawsuit a few hours after Governor Newsom
signed the new quota law. 

AB 979 requires publicly held corporations to have a minimum
of one director from an “underrepresented community” on its
board by the end of the 2021 calendar year and up to three
“underrepresented-community” board members by the end
of the 2022 calendar year, depending on the size of the board.
The bill defines “director from an underrepresented community”
to mean “an individual who self-identifies as Black,
African American, Hispanic, Latino, Asian, Pacific Islander,
Native American, Native Hawaiian, or Alaska Native, or who
self-identifies as gay, lesbian, bisexual, or transgender.”

Judicial Watch filed the lawsuit (Robin Crest, et al. v. Alex Padilla,
in his official capacity as Secretary of State of the State of California
(No.20ST-CV-37513)) the same day Governor Newsom signed the
bill in order to prevent the Secretary of State’s office from expending
taxpayer funds and taxpayer-financed resources to implement the
law and/or ensure compliance with AB 979’s racial, ethnic, sexual
preference and transgender-based quotas. According to the
Assembly Appropriations Committee AB 979 “will result in ongoing
costs in the hundreds of thousands of dollars to gather demographic
information and compile a report on this data on its internet website.”


In its complaint Judicial Watch argues:

{1}Any expenditure of taxpayer funds or taxpayer-financed resources
    AB 979 is illegal under the California Constitution.  The legislation’s
    requirement that certain corporations appoint a specific number of
    directors based upon race, ethnicity, sexual preference, and
    transgender status is immediately suspect and presumptively
    invalid and triggers strict scrutiny review by the court.


{2}Because it classifies directors by virtue of their race, ethnicity,
    sexual preference, or transgender status, AB 979 can only be
    justified by a compelling governmental interest, and its use of
    race and ethnicity must be narrowly tailored to serve that
    compelling interest.


{3}As California cannot make these difficult showings, AB 979 is
    unconstitutional and any expenditure of taxpayer funds or
    taxpayer-financed resources in furtherance of, ensuring
    compliance with, or otherwise effectuating the racial, ethnicity,
    sexual preference, and transgender quotas required by AB 979
    is illegal.     

The Floor Analysis produced by the California Senate during
deliberation on the bill identified “potential constitutional issues
posed by” AB 979. It described AB 979 as “requiring certain
corporations to appoint a certain number of directors who
self-identify as Black, African American, Hispanic, Latino, Asian,
Pacific Islander, Native American, Native Hawaiian or Alaskan Native”
and noted that, under the California Constitution, “a statute
that draws a distinction based upon race or ethnicity in this fashion –
whether remedial or punitive in intent – is suspect and only passes
constitutional muster if it can meet the strict scrutiny test: that the
statute is narrowly drawn to meet a compelling government interest.” 
The analysis also stated, “the existence of general societal
discrimination will not ordinarily satisfy the courts.”


Judicial Watch asks the court to halt the quota law:



A judgment declaring any and all expenditures of taxpayer funds and
taxpayer-financed resources in furtherance of, ensuring compliance with,
or otherwise effectuating the racial, ethnicity, sexual preference, and
transgender quotas required by AB 979 to be illegal; and

An injunction permanently prohibiting Defendant from expending or
causing the expenditure of taxpayer funds and taxpayer-financed
resources in furtherance of, ensuring compliance with, or otherwise
effectuating the racial, ethnicity, sexual preference, and transgender
quotas required by AB 979.




In a related case, Judicial Watch is prosecuting a taxpayer lawsuit
that challenges California’s gender quotas
(Crest et al. v. Padilla, (No.19ST-CV-27561)). In June, in a
major development, the court held that Judicial Watch’s clients
have standing to sue under state law and Judicial Watch attorneys
are now in discovery, which could involve deposition testimony
of various California officials.

“California’s government has a penchant for quotas that are
brazenly unconstitutional,” said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton.
“Gender quotas and now new quotas for numerous other groups
for corporate boards are slaps in the face to the core American
value of equal protection under the law. While California skirts
bankruptcy and burns up due to fiscal abandon, its leftist political
leadership would waste tax dollars to implement illegal and
divisive quotas.”