Longtime Hispanic Scholarship Now Open to All Students

The Hispanic Scholarship Fund will grant scholarships to students of any race or ethnicity beginning in 2027, ending a yearlong legal battle initiated by the anti–affirmative action group the American Alliance for Equal Rights.

The group’s lawsuit alleged that HSF discriminated against non-Hispanics by requiring that applicants be at least one-quarter Hispanic, regardless of their race. Since its founding in 1975, HSF has doled out more than $825 million in scholarships as part of its mission to help make education more accessible to Hispanics, according to its website. Beginning next year, students of any race or ethnicity can apply for scholarships, as long as they “demonstrate a commitment to supporting, celebrating and advancing the success of Hispanics in the United States,” the group said in a news release. 

HSF officials said the lawsuit did not drive their decision to expand the eligibility criteria, although the change does end the litigation. The HSF did not respond to Inside Higher Ed’s requests for comment Tuesday. 

The HSF had been considering dropping its ethnicity requirement before the lawsuit was filed, but chose to defend itself in the case because leaders “believed that it was important to vindicate the right of organizations like HSF to award scholarships and support to racially disadvantaged communities if it aligns with an organization’s strategic vision,” the release said.

“We believe that the district court’s decision in September 2026 in our case did just that,” the group said in a statement, referring to a ruling by a federal judge in Washington, D.C., to dismiss parts of the case but allow others to continue. 

“We believe that the court made clear that scholarships for racially disadvantaged communities do not violate federal civil rights laws,” the group wrote, though they acknowledged the ruling would have required them to change aspects of how the program was run. 

On Tuesday, the HSF website still listed outdated eligibility criteria, noting that all students of Hispanic heritage could apply, regardless of their race. 

In a statement on Tuesday, the American Alliance for Equal Rights said it settled the lawsuit against HSF. The group is led by Edward Blum, president of Students for Fair Admissions, the group that successfully sued Harvard University and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill for their use of race in admissions. 

“The American Alliance for Equal Rights believes that race and ethnicity should never affect the opportunities that are available to students,” Blum said in a statement. “The Alliance applauds HSF for making its valuable scholarship and support services available to all students.”

Since the 2023 Supreme Court decision on the consideration of race in college admissions, the future of race-based scholarships has been unclear. The Trump administration has interpreted the ruling to be a ban on all race-based policies and programs, and Blum and other conservative activists have filed several lawsuits and federal civil rights complaints against certain scholarship programs. Meanwhile, advocates have argued that private charitable organizations should be free to give money to whomever they like.