*An Atlanta venture capital fund has ceased running a grant program for small businesses owned by Black women as part of a settlement in a lawsuit brought by an anti-affirmative action group.
Reuters reports that the Fearless Fund, led by CEO and founding partner Arian Simone, settled on a June decision by a federal appeals court, which sided with the American Alliance for Equal Rights non-profit. The court found that the program breached a Civil War-era law prohibiting racial discrimination in contracting.
We reported previously that the non-profit was founded by Edward Blum, the man who successfully led the fight to end affirmative action in higher education. Blum filed a lawsuit against the Fearless Fund for investing specifically in Black female entrepreneurs.
Blum, the founder of Students for Fair Admissions, the group behind the anti-affirmative action case that reached the Supreme Court, took legal action against the fund for allegedly “operating a racially discriminatory program that blatantly violates Section 1981’s guarantee of race neutrality.”
Per the Fearless Fund website, the organization is described as “built by women of color for women of color.”
“The program being challenged is racially exclusive, thus violating our nation’s civil rights laws,” Blum previously told TechCrunch. “It is to be hoped that other programs like this one end these practices and offer the benefits to all small businesses regardless of the owner’s race.”
The Fearless Fund noted that in 2022, businesses owned by Black women received less than 1% of the $288 billion invested by venture capital firms. The fund aimed to address this significant gap.
A trial court judge initially ruled in favor of the Fearless Fund. However, in June, a 2-1 panel from the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta determined that the program likely violated the law.
In a statement released Wednesday, Blum said his group “encouraged the Fearless Fund to open its grant contest to Hispanic, Asian, Native American and white women but Fearless has decided instead to end it entirely.”
READ MORE FROM EURWEB.COM: Another Setback! Eleventh Circuit Halts Fearless Fund’s Grant Program for Black Women in Landmark DEI Case | VIDEO
