By Kanishka Singh
(Reuters) – California governor Gavin Newsom on Saturday vetoed a bill passed recently by state lawmakers to explicitly ban caste discrimination, citing that exiting laws already prohibited ancestry discrimination, which made the bill “unnecessary.”
Newsom’s veto marked a rare but consequential setback in the movement against caste discrimination that had picked up momentum this year in North America. Had the bill been signed into law, California would have become the first U.S. state to explicitly ban caste discrimination.
The issue is important to the South Asian diaspora, particularly the Indian and Hindu communities. The caste system is among the world’s oldest forms of rigid social stratification.
Here are some examples of recent policy steps across North America to fight caste discrimination:
SEATTLE
In February, Seattle became the first U.S. city to outlaw caste discrimination after its local council voted to add caste to the city’s anti-discrimination laws.
TORONTO
In March, Toronto’s school board became the first in Canada to recognize that caste discrimination existed in the city’s schools and asked a provincial human rights body to help in creating a framework to address the issue.
FRESNO
In September, Fresno, California, became only the second U.S. city to ban caste discrimination after a unanimous city council vote.
EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTIONS
Last year, California State University became the first U.S. university system to add caste as a protected category to its anti-discrimination policy.
In late 2022, Brown University became the first Ivy League school to add official caste protections, when it added caste to its nondiscrimination policy. Harvard University subsequently added caste as a protected class to its nondiscrimination and anti-harassment policy.
CALIFORNIA
A bill to ban caste discrimination in California was introduced and authored by Democratic state Senator Aisha Wahab, an Afghan American, in March. An earlier version of it passed the state Senate before undergoing revisions.
The revised version was passed by California’s state Assembly in late August and by the state Senate in early September with a near unanimous vote before the bill was vetoed by Newsom.
(Reporting by Kanishka Singh in Washington; Editing by Jamie Freed)