Harris’ new vote-buying try is a divisive, unconstitutional ‘equity’ scheme

Kamala Harris is rushing to fix a growing hole in her support: black men.

She’s trying to buy their votes with thinly veiled taxpayer-funded giveaways — “fully forgivable” $20,000 loans — she says are meant just for them. 

The money can be used to “purchase a van for a catering business . . . buy professional hairstyling equipment and chair space for a barber shop, buy lawn mowers and tools for a landscaper, and more,” according to a statement from her campaign.

If you’re a white male and having trouble growing your business, will you be eligible? The US Constitution says you should be. 

But Harris appeared to be doubling down on the notion — increasingly unpopular with the public, and now widely challenged in court — that certain benefits should be reserved only for minorities, for the sake of “equity.”

On Monday, as Harris traveled to Erie County, Pa. for a stop at a local black-owned coffee shop, her campaign announced she’s unleashing “the untapped ambition” within the black community.

She promised one million “loans,” up to $20,000 apiece, to “Black entrepreneurs and others who have historically faced barriers to starting a new business or growing an existing business.”  

That language suggests white men won’t be eligible — because the phrase “historically faced barriers” is one (like “historically underserved” and “socially disadvantaged”) that has a specific meaning in the federal code: They are shorthand for eligibility based on group identity, not on hardships an individual applicant has faced. 

Two days later, an unnamed Harris aide tried to walk the promise back — telling the Wall Street Journal that the veep’s program, announced with such hoopla, would be “open to everyone.”

Of course, what is said on the campaign trail by an anonymous flunky is one thing. Congress would have to actually pass a law to authorize spending billions on “forgivable loans” to aspiring entrepreneurs.

And would Harris, as president, sign a law with language that excluded whites from benefits? You bet. 

After all, she backs the Downpayment Toward Equity Act, a bill to boost homeownership that reserves the largest grants for buyers from a “socially and economically disadvantaged group,” defined as being “Black, Hispanic, Native American or Asian American.”

Harris has consistently rejected the concept of equal treatment in favor of equity. 

In a Twitter post from November 2020, she said the problem with treating everyone the same, regardless of race, is that  “We’re not all starting from the same place.” 

Equitable treatment, she explained, means giving some people more — “so that we all end up in the same place.”

The Biden-Harris administration announced on Day 1 that “equity” would be the guiding principle for every federal department and agency. That included the Small Business Administration.

Three and a half years later, Isabel Casillas Guzman, its SBA administrator, boasted that loans to “historically underserved entrepreneurs” have soared — tripling to black-owned businesses, specifically.

The administration also vastly expanded the Minority Business Development Agency, which offers credit and training programs exclusively to businesses owned by minorities.

Federal courts are now slamming these programs for treating Americans unequally based on their race.

In July 2023, a federal court in Tennessee barred the SBA and the Department of Agriculture from offering programs and contracts to minority businesses on the presumption they are “disadvantaged,” while businesses owned by whites are presumed ineligible.

Judge Clifton Corker ruled that a business must prove it is “disadvantaged” by offering a “narrative” specifying what discrimination its owners have faced. 

Being part of a “historically” disadvantaged group is not enough under the Constitution.

In another federal lawsuit, three white business owners in Texas sued the MBDA, arguing its programs violated their constitutional right to equal treatment under the law. 

US District Court Judge Mark Pittman agreed. In March, Pittman ruled that the Constitution bars the government, including the MBDA, from treating businesses differently based on race.

Pittman cited Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard, the recent Supreme Court ruling that struck down race-conscious university admissions, in his decision.

Harris seems to be thumbing her nose at these recent court decisions by rolling out more “equity” programs that discriminate against whites — including a plan for federal grants to support “leadership training and mentorship” within public schools for “young Black men.”   

This, too, is illegal under the Constitution, and immoral to boot:  All students should have access to such programs.

After decades in which reverse discrimination created resentments and racial tensions, Americans are finally making strides toward the society our Constitution promises — one in which people are treated as individuals, not pigeonholed according to their group identity.

But Harris just doesn’t get it. She would be the Equity President.

Betsy McCaughey is a former lieutenant governor of New York.