{"id":2613688,"date":"2026-06-13T06:09:01","date_gmt":"2026-06-13T10:09:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/the-american-bar-association-is-unfit-to-accredit-law-schools-and-the-trump-admin-can-stop-them\/"},"modified":"2026-06-13T06:09:01","modified_gmt":"2026-06-13T10:09:01","slug":"the-american-bar-association-is-unfit-to-accredit-law-schools-and-the-trump-admin-can-stop-them","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/the-american-bar-association-is-unfit-to-accredit-law-schools-and-the-trump-admin-can-stop-them\/","title":{"rendered":"ABA Is Unfit To Accredit Law Schools. USED Can Stop Them"},"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\">22<\/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%2Fthe-american-bar-association-is-unfit-to-accredit-law-schools-and-the-trump-admin-can-stop-them%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=2613688&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 class=\"readmore\">\n    <button onclick=\"showReadMore()\" id=\"readmorebtn\">Read more&#8230;<\/button>\n<\/p>\n<hr id=\"line\">\n<span id=\"more\"><\/p>\n<div>\n<p>Washington, D.C. \u2014 The American Bar Association (ABA) has injected far-left politics into America\u2019s entire legal system through its power to accredit law schools, but this summer, the U.S. Department of Education will have the opportunity to strip that power.<\/p>\n<p>The National Advisory Committee on Institutional Quality and Integrity (NACIQI) is a federal advisory board within the Department of Education that \u201cprovides recommendations regarding accrediting agencies that monitor the academic quality of postsecondary institutions and educational programs for federal purposes.\u201d <\/p>\n<p>The ABA\u2019s approval by this committee is up for renewal later this summer. The process that is normally a rubber stamp could now be scrutinized by the Trump administration\u2019s more aggressive approach to returning integrity to higher education. Speaking at a Defending Education roundtable on the Hill Thursday, Sarah Parshall Perry, the group\u2019s vice president, said she believes this year\u2019s federal approval process is \u201cgoing to be different\u201d for the ABA. <\/p>\n<p>Defending Education President Nicole Neily described accreditation as the \u201cvelvet glove around the iron fist\u201d because of its often overlooked power in \u201cshaping and twisting\u201d education in America. One of the most egregious offenders is the ABA. The ABA is the only federally recognized accreditor for almost all of the country\u2019s nearly 200 law schools. That means it controls access to federal student loans, bar eligibility, and other career opportunities for students. This gives it enormous power over the entire legal profession.<\/p>\n<p>Over many years, the group implemented a massive diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) regime across America\u2019s law schools. In 2024, its <a href=\"https:\/\/www.americanbar.org\/content\/dam\/aba\/administrative\/legal_education_and_admissions_to_the_bar\/standards\/2024-2025\/2024-2025-standards-and-rules-for-approval-of-law-schools.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Standard 206<\/a> mandated tighter affirmative action in law school hiring, and the post-George Floyd riots <a href=\"https:\/\/www.law.buffalo.edu\/beyond\/aba303c.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Standard 303(c)<\/a> required all accredited law schools to teach \u201cbias, cross-cultural competency, and racism,\u201d both at the beginning of law school and prior to graduation.<\/p>\n<p>The ABA <a href=\"https:\/\/www.abajournal.com\/web\/article\/legal-ed-council-moves-forward-proposals-to-end-diversity-standard-allow-alternative-bar-pathways\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">paused<\/a> Standard 206 and announced it is considering repealing Standard 303(c), but only after the Trump administration threatened the race-hustling regime ABA has embedded in the legal profession for decades. Given the ABA\u2019s clear left-wing priorities, these incomplete moves seem to be an attempt to avoid penalties for enforcing institutional racism until Democrats control the federal government again.<\/p>\n<p>According to Defending Education, 72 DEI offices remain or have simply rebranded on law school campuses, while 62 law schools still require Standard 303(c) coursework. Parshall Perry <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/SarahPPerry\/status\/2055452520252645422?s=20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">stated<\/a>, \u201cPlay-acting at law school accreditation and ethics while jamming liberal orthodoxy down the throats of the nation \u2014 [the ABA] voted to officially eliminate its unconstitutional DEI rule for law schools (standard 206). Approval may take until 2027 \u2013 so I\u2019ll believe it when I see it.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Eighty percent of amicus briefs the ABA submits to federal courts bolster left-wing causes, Parshall Perry said. She noted the ABA took the anti-gun position in <em>D.C. v. Heller<\/em>, the pro-child mutilation position in <em>United States v. Skrmetti<\/em>, the pro-abortion position in <em>Dobbs v. Jackson Women\u2019s Health Organization<\/em>, and the pro-racial gerrymandering position in <em>Louisiana v. Callais<\/em>. The Supreme Court ruled all of the ABA\u2019s positions on these matters unconstitutional, she noted.<\/p>\n<p>One University of Virginia law school graduate on the panel, who asked to remain anonymous so her career and associates wouldn\u2019t be damaged by affiliation with conservatives, said the ABA\u2019s far-left requirements are amplified through the broader left-wing law school culture.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe issue isn\u2019t just that the ABA is the gatekeeper here, it\u2019s the kind of culture the ABA\u2019s requirements push schools to entrench,\u201d she said. \u201cWe\u2019re training lawyers in an environment that I think too often encourages moral sorting rather than critical inquiry. Students learn to ask whether an idea is associated with the right people before asking whether it\u2019s true. They learn to categorize arguments before they analyze them.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>America\u2019s law schools cannot survive the ABA\u2019s attempt to fool the Department of Education. The only path to save legal education in America is to strip the organization of its power to accredit, and stand up fresh accreditation institutions committed to the rule of law and constitutional jurisprudence.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cYou can\u2019t win a war that you don\u2019t acknowledge exists, and a war is being waged against Western civilization,\u201d Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, said at the meeting. \u201cThey\u2019re trying to use the universities, and importantly, our law schools to indoctrinate the next generation of leaders, so that they\u2019ll take away Western civilization.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Roy backed an effort by Rep. Randy Fine, R-Fla., to open law school accreditation to more organizations: \u201cThere shouldn\u2019t be these left-captured monopolies that get to decide what we believe and what we do,\u201d Fine said at the roundtable.<\/p>\n<p>Fine noted only 11 percent of lawyers are members of the ABA, yet the organization wields outsized power to push leftism on America\u2019s law schools. He said the way Florida dealt with similar extremism among teachers\u2019 unions was to require at least 51 percent of a workplace to be members for a union to operate.<\/p>\n<p>Some states have parted ways with the ABA, including Florida and Texas, while Tennessee and Ohio are moving in a similar direction. Still, federal recognition of the ABA as the only group with the authority to accredit law schools \u2014 an \u201caccreditation cartel,\u201d Parshall Perry called it \u2014 remains an issue.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI was staffing the APA orientation bias training. I found myself weighing my answer more carefully than I should have. \u2026 Students and faculty alike were highly attuned to institutional signals. You learned which ideas could be expressed confidently, which required Disclaimers, and which were better left unsaid,\u201d the UVA graduate explained. \u201cRepeatedly, and up through graduation, I spoke with people so many times who were so willing to voice concerns privately, but not publicly, because of blowback. And because law school was not only educational, but also professional, those signals matter.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>At UVA, law students are automatically enrolled in the ABA, and must actively opt out if they wish. Edward Goul, a student at the University of Pennsylvania\u2019s law school, said he had to sit through mandatory DEI courses \u201caddressing racial bias and applying an equity lens to our courses.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cFrom the very beginning, they\u2019ve sent a message that there\u2019s a correct set of premises and ideas that are okay in law schools, and questioning them isn\u2019t really an option,\u201d Goul said, adding that while some of the most egregious racial requirements have been scaled back, the environment they created has remained.<\/p>\n<p>Goul and the UVA student pointed to different outgrowths of such an environment, which include some students being afraid to be seen in the same room as a meeting of the campus Federalist Society, a non-leftist lawyers association. They also talked about \u201cblind grading,\u201d in which assignments are graded without the grader knowing the student\u2019s identity. If a student makes anything resembling a textualist legal argument, they are marked down, rendering the entire \u201cblind grading\u201d framework useless.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cYou don\u2019t have to look much further than what we now have on the United States Supreme Court in the form of Ketanji Brown Jackson and understand what we\u2019re dealing with activists that are put forward by an agenda, not to interpret the law and try to defend the law with whatever disagreement you have in that interpretation, but to advance a radical ideology through law,\u201d Roy said.<\/p>\n<hr>\n<p>   Breccan F. Thies is the White House correspondent for The Federalist. He is a co-recipient of the 2025 Dao Prize for Excellence in Investigative Journalism. As an investigative journalist, he previously covered education and culture issues for the Washington Examiner and Breitbart News. He holds a degree from the University of Virginia and is a 2022 Claremont Institute Publius Fellow. You can follow him on X: @BreccanFThies.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Washington, D.C. \u2014 The American Bar Association (ABA) has injected far-left politics into America\u2019s entire legal system through its power to accredit law schools, but this summer, the U.S. Department of Education will have the opportunity to strip that power. The National Advisory Committee on Institutional Quality and Integrity (NACIQI) is a federal advisory board<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":179,"featured_media":2613689,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/pexels-dpsinghbhullar-30483132-1024x683.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[546],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2613688","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-federalist"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/pexels-dpsinghbhullar-30483132-1024x683.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2613688","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\/179"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2613688"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2613688\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2613689"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2613688"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2613688"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2613688"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}