As COVID-19 restrictions ease, members of an initiative to reject affirmative action in California gathered to celebrate their November victory fighting race-based preferences in the public sector. Proposition 16 would have allowed diversity to factor into public employment, education, and contracting decisions by amending the California Constitution to remove the current ban on affirmative action that prohibits the consideration of race, sex, ethnicity, and gender by government and public institutions. The proposition failed the majority vote during last November’s general election, receiving 57 percent opposition by California voters. In Lake Forest, a panel speakers addressed an audience March 20, saying although the team won its most recent battle on affirmative action, the war is still ongoing. “We’re engaged in a modern-day civil war,” Ward Connerly, president of “No on 16,” said during the meeting. “We are really now at a stage where we’re fighting to determine what structure American life is going to be. “Our landslide victory over Prop. 16 last November shows that Californians believe in equality …