Comcast Settles Case, Changes Woke Policy Awarding Race-Based Grants

Another case won by the Wisconsin Institute for Law and Liberty was based upon the argument that people cannot be discriminated against based on their sexual orientation or skin color.

Comcast settled a dispute with WILL over its Comcast RISE program. The program granted grants to small businesses if they were 51% owned or controlled by an individual. “Black, indigenous, a person of color, or female.”

Dan Lenington is the lead attorney for WILL. He stated that federal civil right laws make clear that discrimination on the basis of race is against the law.

“Discrimination is still discrimination regardless if you’re doing it for what you believe are the right reasons,” Lennington spoke to The Center Square. “Because there are a lot of people in the history of the world who have been discriminated based on race, and they think it’s the right reason at the time.”

Comcast’s other RISE requirements are not too severe. Eligible businesses must be open for at most one year and must be located in a Comcast service zone.

Lennington claimed that Comcast initially pitched the RISE program to small businesses as a post pandemic boost.

“They said that the whole purpose of the program was to help those businesses who had been hit especially hard by COVID. Which begs the question ‘Why didn’t they just help businesses that were particularly hit hard by COVID?’,” Lennington explained. “Why couldn’t they treat businesses on an individual basis, rather than lumping them together based on the color of the skin of the people who own the business?”

While the case was brought in southern Indiana by a federal court, WILL represented clients throughout Indiana, Pennsylvania and Tennessee.

Lenington claimed that WILL’s Equality Under the Law Project has evolved into a national effort. It has also produced numerous legal victories against race-based policy. WILL has successfully sued the Biden Administration, the state Wisconsin and Madison Metropolitan Schools multiple times.

Lennington however said that Comcast’s case against them may be the first.

“We believe this is the first settlement or other resolution of a case of race discrimination against a Fortune 500 company for a program they developed in the wake of the summer of 2020,” Lenington spoke. “I would say this is the first settlement in a case of woke corporate policies.”