Orlando, FL: The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit today struck down the higher-education provisions of the Stop W.O.K.E. Act, a classroom-censorship law in Florida that severely restricted educators’ ability to teach about race and gender in schools and workplaces.
The court ruled the higher education provision of the law was unconstitutional, saying: “Florida’s salary-for-speech rule is a breathtaking assertion of power to ban unpopular ideas from public discourse in the very places the State’s own statutes recognize as centers of inquiry—classrooms where students are trusted to puzzle through ideas that are good and bad, easy and hard, ideally getting ever closer to the truth.” Read more here.
Below is Representative Dr. Anna V. Eskamani’s statement in response:
“This is a huge and long-awaited win for the First Amendment, academic freedom, and the people of Florida. Today’s decision affirms a principle that should never have been in doubt: our public universities are places for open inquiry, not government-approved thought.
The Stop W.O.K.E. Act was never about protecting students. It was about control, dictating which ideas professors could teach and which parts of our history students were allowed to examine. As the court powerfully stated, this was “a breathtaking assertion of power to ban unpopular ideas from public discourse in the very places the State’s own statutes recognize as centers of inquiry.” When the government appoints itself the arbiter of acceptable classroom ideas, it betrays both the First Amendment and the students it claims to serve.
Students are capable of grappling with difficult subjects. From racism, sexism, privilege, and the full, complicated truth of our nation’s past. As the court affirmed, “the First Amendment trusts students to figure it out for themselves.” So do I. We do not build stronger citizens by narrowing what they are permitted to learn.
I want to thank the professors who stood up as plaintiffs, and all of the legal partners for their years of work on this case. This ruling is the first time an appellate court has weighed in on this national censorship movement, and it sends a clear message to the more than 30 states pursuing similar laws: academic freedom is not negotiable.
Our classrooms should be rooms of curiosity and courage. Today, the court helped keep them that way.”