The fate of the country’s first taxpayer-funded reparations program is hanging in the air after the city in question, Evanston, Illinois, defended its program and asked a judge to dismiss a lawsuit that argues the race-based payments are unconstitutional.
At issue is whether Evanston’s first-of-its-kind reparations effort — for which the city allocated $20 million for a program to provide $25,000 payments to Black people who lived at Evanston between 1919 and 1969 and their descendants — violates the Equal Protection Clause. Judicial Watch filed the lawsuit earlier this year, claiming that its six plaintiffs would be eligible for the reparations payments except for the fact that they weren’t Black.
