Would anyone be surprised that a student with a high GPA and high SAT score would have an even higher chance of graduating within six years?
The argument that it should be eliminated because it’s not the best criteria would logically extend to evaluating everything that goes into an application and eliminating everything but the very highest predictor.
Does anyone believe a single 500 word essay is a better predictor of college success? If not, why bother having it? No more holistic evaluations - back to force ranking based on one number? Because it’s “best”.
More positively correlated data is rarely worse.