California Democrats vote to reintroduce racial discrimination through affirmative action

Democratic legislators in California on Wednesday voted to reverse the state's current ban on racial preferences, thus reinstating affirmative action by ratifying Assembly Constitutional Amendment 5 (ACA5).

The measure "would reintroduce racial preferences for who get a state job or contract, or who is admitted to a state university," according to The Wall Street Journal editorial board, and will appear on Californians' ballots in November.

The state's 24-year-old ban on affirmative action would be reversed if it passes.

Democratic California State Senator Steve Bradford said he had "seen enough," and praised the new measure.

“It’s time to do the right thing,” he said, according to the Daily Caller. “It’s time to end the racism that exists in California.”

But Republican State Senator Ling Ling Chang slammed the amendment for installing discrimination in an effort to supposedly fight discrimination. He compared the measure to the Chinese Exclusion Act.

“The problem with ACA5 is that it takes the position that we must fight discrimination with more discrimination,” Chang said.

California's attempt to reintroduce affirmative action has been met with heavy criticism. WSJ's editorial board published a piece, titled "A Vote for Discrimination," condemning the amendment as counter to the stated goal of the state's Democrats.

“We live in strange times, and strange indeed is that, while deploring racism, the Democratic Legislature in California has voted to codify racial discrimination in state law,” the Journal said.

The editorial board put forth the question in asking “[i]f the problem is police singling out African-American young men without cause, how is the answer to sort people by race in other areas of life, sowing resentment and pitting American against American?”

“Judging individuals by the color of their skin is antithetical to equal justice under the law,” the editorial added. “Let’s hope Californians hold on to this American principle of equality that goes back to the Declaration of Independence, the 14th Amendment, and the civil-rights movement.”

Andrew Doyle, an English satirist best known for this "woke" character, Titania McGrath, took to Twitter, tweeting: “The California senate has voted to delete this from its constitution: ‘The state shall not discriminate against, or grant preferential treatment to, any individual or group on the basis of race, sex, color, ethnicity, or national origin,'” he posted via Twitter. “So progressive!”