The manufactured belief that CRT is merely a continuation of civil rights–era efforts to ensure equality of opportunity provides valuable cover for those pushing race-conscious policies and practices that prioritize equity in outcomes.

On a recent episode of his cable television program, Bill Maher asked Bernie Sanders to explain the difference between equality and equity, and the long-winded senator was at an unusual loss for words.

“I don’t know what the answer to that is,” Sanders mumbled after an awkward pause. Pressed to clarify his position, Sanders composed himself and offered only that he supports “equality of opportunity” over equal outcomes. He does?

If this answer is sincere, it would put Sanders, a self-described democratic socialist, substantially to the right of the “equity”-obsessed Biden administration and today’s public education establishment. If, on the other hand, Sanders was merely being politically adroit, his answer demonstrates how quickly the Left’s language game breaks down when basic definitions are required.

Sanders isn’t dumb. He knows what the legacy media are loath to admit, particularly on the issue of racial inequality: most Americans, including most Democrats, strongly favor equality of opportunity over government’s assurance of equitable results.

One reason the Left doesn’t want this debate can be seen in the fight over teaching critical race theory in American schools. Recall that CRT bills itself as an academic theory that emphasizes how race intersects with societal institutions to reproduce and sustain unequal outcomes observed across racial groups today. Focusing only on whether CRT is formally being taught in K–12 lesson plans, however, is a distraction. The Left prefers to keep the dispute focused on this point of contention, which boils down to precise definitions, because it obscures a larger fight: a clash between politically popular principles of color blindness and nondiscrimination, on the one hand, and deeply unpopular schooling policies and practices that emphasize race-consciousness and equitable outcomes, on the other.

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