The Texas chapter of the American Federation of Teachers sued the state’s education department on Tuesday, accusing it of an improper “wave of retaliation” against public school employees over their social media comments following the killing of conservative political activist Charlie Kirk.
The lawsuit says the Texas Education Agency and Commissioner Mike Morath violated the free speech rights of teachers and other school staff because they directed local school districts to document what the education agency described as “vile content” posted online after Kirk’s fatal shooting in September.
Despite calls for civility, some people who criticized Kirk after his death drew backlash from Republicans seeking to punish anyone they believe dishonored him. Educators and other school employees in at least 16 states were fired, suspended, or reprimanded for their social media comments following Kirk’s death.
In the months since, those disciplinary actions have spurred legal battles of their own. Fired staff have argued their districts either did not have clear social media policies or those policies were unconstitutionally vague or broad, or implemented in ways that violate teachers’ free-speech rights. At least one California teacher also contends school board members republicized a retracted comment in ways that exposed her to physical threats and harassment.
School chiefs or governors in at least four states—Florida, Oklahoma, Indiana, and Texas—have all vowed to revoke the licenses of teachers over controversial posts.
But in a press briefing Tuesday, AFT President Randi Weingarten noted that only Texas and Florida chiefs explicitly called for administrators to send in tips on teachers’ potentially divisive speech.
Texas AFT’s lawsuit says the Texas agency has received more than 350 complaints about individual educators that could subject them to investigation. It cites the cases of four unnamed teachers—one in the Houston area and three in the San Antonio area—who were investigated over social media posts critical of Kirk or of the reaction to his death. According to the lawsuit, the Houston-area teacher was fired, while the three San Antonio-area teachers remain under investigation.
The lawsuit was filed in U.S. District Court in Austin. Texas AFT represents about 66,000 teachers and other school employees.
“State leaders have decided to score a few cheap points, and it was worth the disciplinary actions and the doxxing and the death threats targeted at Texas teachers,” Texas AFT President Zeph Capo said at the press briefing. “Meanwhile, educators and their families are afraid that they’ll lose everything: their livelihoods, their reputations, and their very purpose for being, which is to actually impart critical thinking.”
TEA said it could not comment “on outstanding legal matters.”
Morath told school superintendents in a Sept. 12 letter that social media posts could violate Texas educators’ code of ethics and promised that “each instance will be thoroughly investigated.”
The lawsuit argues that the letter represents a state policy that is overly broad and too vague, allowing enforcement to be arbitrary and inconsistent. Federal courts have generally held that overly broad and vague policies and laws aren’t permissible under the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution because they could squelch protected speech.
The lawsuit said the Houston-area teacher expressed a view online that “karma played a role” in the death of Kirk, a strong advocate of gun rights. It said the San Antonio teachers compared the widespread outrage on the right over Kirk’s death to a lack of outrage over other violence, criticized Kirk’s positions on immigration, or criticized him for comments that his critics considered racist, anti-immigrant or misogynist.
The lawsuit said none of these posts celebrated or promoted violence.
Kirk embodied the pugnacious, populist conservatism that has taken over the Republican Party since President Donald Trump’s political rise, an unabashed Christian conservative who often made provocative statements about politics, gender and race. He launched Turning Point USA, a right-wing group, in 2012, targeting younger people and venturing onto liberal-leaning college campuses where many GOP activists were nervous to tread. He was shot during such an appearance at a university in Utah.
In addition to reversing disciplinary actions and dismissing investigations underway against Texas teachers in the lawsuit, Capo and Weingarten said the unions are asking for a court injunction requiring Morath to revoke the Sept. 12 letter and provide clearer guidance for teachers and administrators on how to discuss Kirk’s killing and other divisive topics.
“When the entire world now sees an assassination in a completely age-inappropriate way on every social media channel there is, [teachers] needed their superintendent in the state to give some advice and some clarity on how we make kids feel safe the next day,” Weingarten said.
She likened the state’s actions to McCarthyism and other famously skewed tribunals: “Instead, what happened was they got blame and shame and a Star Chamber.”
