{"id":1712186,"date":"2022-10-26T14:49:29","date_gmt":"2022-10-26T18:49:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1712186"},"modified":"2022-10-26T14:49:34","modified_gmt":"2022-10-26T18:49:34","slug":"facing-lawsuit-pfizer-says-fellowship-program-that-excludes-whites-and-asians-serves-public-interest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/facing-lawsuit-pfizer-says-fellowship-program-that-excludes-whites-and-asians-serves-public-interest\/","title":{"rendered":"Facing Lawsuit, Pfizer Says Fellowship Program That Excludes Whites and Asians Serves \u2018Public Interest\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">28<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Ffacing-lawsuit-pfizer-says-fellowship-program-that-excludes-whites-and-asians-serves-public-interest%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1712186&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><p>By Jonathan Stempel<\/p>\n<p>NEW YORK (Reuters)\u2014Pfizer Inc said its fellowship program for minorities serves the public interest, as the drugmaker defends against a lawsuit by a group of medical professionals that claims the program illegally excludes whites and Asian Americans.<\/p>\n<p>In a Tuesday night filing, Pfizer urged a Manhattan federal judge to reject Do No Harm&#8217;s request for an injunction against filling the 2023 class for its Breakthrough Fellowship Program, which enrolls Blacks, Latinos, and Native Americans.<\/p>\n<p>Pfizer said the two-year-old program helps address historical discrimination in the workplace, and difficulties in recruiting, retaining and promoting minorities.<\/p>\n<p>It aims to enroll 100 fellows by 2025, as part of a nine-year commitment to boost minority representation.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;There exists a strong public policy in favor of voluntary affirmative action plans,&#8221; Pfizer said. &#8220;At a minimum, the public interest favors preserving the status quo.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Lawyers for Do No Harm did not immediately respond to requests for comment.<\/p>\n<p>In its Sept. 15 complaint, Do No Harm said Pfizer&#8217;s program was &#8220;discriminatory on its face,&#8221; running afoul of several civil rights laws and violating a federal ban on racial discrimination by companies that accept government healthcare reimbursements.<\/p>\n<p>Fellows receive two years of full-time jobs, fully-funded master&#8217;s degrees, and employment at New York-based Pfizer after completing the program.<\/p>\n<p>Pfizer said Do No Harm lacked standing to sue and could not show irreparable harm, and that its claims would likely fail.<\/p>\n<p>The fellowship program &#8220;does what Congress has encouraged and controlling law allows,&#8221; Pfizer said.<\/p>\n<p>On Oct. 31, the Supreme Court will consider the future of affirmative action in higher education, as it hears arguments on race-conscious admissions programs at Harvard University and the University of North Carolina.<\/p>\n<p>Among the precedents at risk is a 2003 Supreme Court decision where Justice Sandra Day O&#8217;Connor said race could be used as one factor among many to achieve diversity.<\/p>\n<p>Pfizer quoted approvingly from O&#8217;Connor, who said &#8220;major American businesses have made clear that the skills needed in today&#8217;s increasingly global marketplace can only be developed through exposure to widely diverse people, cultures, ideas, and viewpoints.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The case is Do No Harm v. Pfizer Inc, U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York, No. 22-07908.<\/p>\n<p>(Reporting by Jonathan Stempel in New York; Additional reporting by Alison Frankel; Editing by Diane Craft)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>NEW YORK (Reuters)\u2014Pfizer Inc said its fellowship program for minorities serves the public interest, as the drugmaker defends against a lawsuit by a group of medical professionals that claims the program illegally excludes whites and Asian Americans.<br \/>\nThe post Facing Lawsuit, Pfizer Says Fellowship Program That Excludes Whites and Asians Serves \u2018Public Interest\u2019 appeared first on Washington Free Beacon.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":66,"featured_media":1712189,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/IMG_2758-scaled-1.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[544],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1712186","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-free-beacon"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/IMG_2758-scaled-1.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1712186","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/66"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1712186"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1712186\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1712189"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1712186"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1712186"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1712186"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}