President Donald Trump has ordered U.S. colleges to submit detailed admissions data to prove they are not considering race.
The directive, issued Thursday, requires institutions to provide information on the race, gender, GPA, and standardized test scores of applicants, admitted students, and enrollees. Schools that fail to comply could face action under Title IV of the Higher Education Act, which governs federal student aid.
The policy follows the 2023 Supreme Court ruling that barred the explicit use of race in admissions decisions, though it allowed applicants to discuss how race shaped their lives in essays. Trump and other conservatives argue that many colleges have exploited that loophole by using personal statements and other “racial proxies” to continue favoring certain groups.
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“The persistent lack of available data — paired with the rampant use of ‘diversity statements’ and other overt and hidden racial proxies — continues to raise concerns about whether race is actually used in admissions decisions in practice,” said the memorandum signed by Trump.
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The order directs Education Secretary Linda McMahon to implement the new reporting rules. The National Center for Education Statistics will collect the data, which will also be made public.
Trump’s move mirrors recent agreements with Brown and Columbia universities, which restored federal research funding after the schools pledged to share admissions data and submit to government audits.
Some higher education leaders doubt the order’s impact.
“Ultimately, will it mean anything? Probably not,” said Jon Fansmith of the American Council on Education in an AP report. “But it does continue this rhetoric from the administration that some students are being preferenced in the admission process at the expense of other students.”
Fansmith noted that, because of the Supreme Court decision, schools cannot ask about race during admissions. Once students enroll, they may be asked, but only voluntarily. That makes demographic data incomplete and campus diversity trends harder to measure.
Since the ruling, the impact on diversity has varied. MIT and Amherst saw significant drops in Black student enrollment, while Yale, Princeton, and the University of Virginia recorded minimal changes. Many colleges have added essays to capture applicants’ life experiences, a strategy the court explicitly allowed.
“Nothing prohibits universities from considering an applicant’s discussion of how race affected the applicant’s life, so long as that discussion is concretely tied to a quality of character or unique ability that the particular applicant can contribute to the university,” Chief Justice John Roberts wrote in 2023.
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Even before the ruling, several states had banned affirmative action. California’s 1996 ban led to sharp declines in Black and Hispanic enrollment at UCLA and Berkeley. The University of California has since spent over $500 million on outreach, created a top-9%-per-high-school admission guarantee, and prioritized first-generation and low-income students. Yet, at Berkeley today, Hispanic students remain underrepresented compared to their share of high school graduates, and Black enrollment has shrunk to 4%.
Michigan’s 2006 ban prompted similar strategies, including outreach to low-income schools and full scholarships for in-state residents from disadvantaged backgrounds. Despite these efforts, Black enrollment at the University of Michigan has dropped from 8% in 2006 to 4% in 2025.
The new federal order marks the latest front in Trump’s broader effort to reshape higher education policy, and sets up a potential legal battle over how much scrutiny the government can apply to universities’ admissions processes.
