October, 19 2021, 05:24pm EDT
ACLU, ACLU of Oklahoma, Lawyers Committee File Lawsuit Challenging Oklahoma Classroom Censorship Bill Banning Race and Gender Discourse
WASHINGTON
A diverse group of students and educators filed a lawsuit today challenging an Oklahoma classroom censorship bill, HB 1775, which severely restricts public school teachers and students from learning and talking about race and gender in the classroom.
The lawsuit was filed by the American Civil Liberties Union, ACLU of Oklahoma, the Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, and pro bono counsel Schulte Roth & Zabel LLP on behalf of plaintiffs the Black Emergency Response Team (BERT); the University of Oklahoma Chapter of the American Association of University Professors (OU-AAUP); the Oklahoma State Conference of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP-OK); the American Indian Movement (AIM) Indian Territory on behalf of itself and its members who are public school students and teachers, a high school student, and Oklahoma public high school teachers Anthony Crawford and Regan Killackey.
Oklahoma is one of eight states across the country that have passed similar laws aimed at censoring discussions around race and gender in the classroom, and this is the first federal lawsuit facially challenging one of these statewide bans. The lawsuit argues HB 1775 not only chills students' and educators' First Amendment right to learn and talk about these issues, but it also prevents students from having an open and complete dialogue about American history -- one that includes the experiences and viewpoints of all historically marginalized communities in this country.
"All young people deserve to learn an inclusive and accurate history in schools, free from censorship or discrimination," said Emerson Sykes, staff attorney with the ACLU Speech, Privacy, and Technology Project. "HB 1775 is so poorly drafted -- in places it is literally indecipherable -- that districts and teachers have no way of knowing what concepts and ideas are prohibited. The bill was intended to inflame a political reaction, not further a legitimate educational interest. These infirmities in the law are all the more troubling because the bill applies to public colleges and universities, where the First Amendment is especially protective of academic freedom."
"H.B. 1775 is an unvarnished attempt to silence the experiences and perspectives of Black, Indigenous, and LGBTQ+ people, and other groups who have long faced exclusion and marginalization in our institutions, including in our schools," said Genevieve Bonadies Torres, associate director of the Educational Opportunities Project with the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law. "The law directly violates the Fourteenth Amendment's command that governmental actors do not engage in racial discrimination. Every student in Oklahoma deserves an equitable education that reflects the rich diversity of the state and provides a full, fact-based discussion of the state's checkered history of racism, sexism, discrimination."
The Oklahoma bill's lead authors in the state House and Senate declared the bill's intent was to prohibit conversations related to "implicit bias," "systemic racism" and "intersectionality," among other concepts. The "banned concepts" were directly excerpted from President Donald Trump's failed Executive Order 13950 that similarly sought to restrict speech of government contractors. The lawsuit argues HB 1775 is an unlawful restraint on freedom of expression by silencing students' and educators' speech through its vague and overbroad terms. It also intentionally targets and denies access to equitable, culturally relevant teaching and ideas that reflect the history and lived experiences of Black, Indigenous, and other people of color; women and girls; and LGBTQ+ students.
"The Black Emergency Response Team (BERT) is a collective comprised of Black student leaders whose mission is to confront racism and various oppressive structures, including this bill that is a direct attack on the education experience of the Black community specifically, and marginalized communities at large on campus," said Lilly Amechi, plaintiff and representative for BERT. "We believe all students deserve to have a free and open exchange about our history -- not one that erases the legacy of discrimination and lived experiences of Black and Brown people, women and girls, and LGBTQ+ individuals."
As a result of the bill's passage, school districts in Oklahoma have instructed teachers to no longer use certain terms, including "diversity" and "white privilege" in their classrooms, and have removed seminal works of literature such as "To Kill a Mockingbird" and "Raisin in the Sun" from its list of "anchor texts." Multiple Oklahoma public schools have also scaled back or eliminated their diversity, equity, and inclusion trainings for teachers and strategic plans. Plaintiff Regan Killackey was instructed to avoid certain concepts, phrases, and books in his curriculum related to race and is no longer able to lead his students in educational conversations about race and gender.
"As someone who has experienced an incredibly privileged teaching career in Edmond, I am acutely aware of the need this community, and all communities, have for healthy analysis, critical conversations, and effective communication," said Regan Killacky, Edmond Public Schools teacher. "H.B. 1775 limits my ability to teach an inclusive and complete history within the walls of my classroom, ultimately restricting the exact type of learning environment all young people deserve -- one free from censorship or discrimination."
The ability for educators and students to have honest conversations around race, gender, and our country's history in schools carry particular importance in Oklahoma, whose history includes the 1889 Land Runs, "Indian" boarding schools, the 1921 Tulsa Massacre, and racially segregated schools.
"Education is a tool of empowerment put to its highest use when teachers and students are afforded the full scope of their constitutional rights to engage in comprehensive, meaningful, and sometimes difficult conversations," said Megan Lambert, ACLU of Oklahoma legal director. "HB 1775 is a direct affront to the constitutional rights of teachers and students across Oklahoma by restricting conversations around race and gender at all levels of education. We bring this case to vindicate the rights of Oklahoma teachers and students and to protect the integrity of our educational institutions."
The groups are asking the court to declare the bill unconstitutional under the First and 14th Amendments and are urging the court to issue a preliminary injunction that would put an immediate stop to the bill and immediately allow students and educators to have full and truthful discussions around race and gender in the classroom.
Below are additional comments from:
Anthony R. Douglas, president of the Oklahoma State Conference NAACP:"H.B. 1775 censors and chills the way Oklahoma teachers and students discuss fraught topics in state and U.S. history, particularly regarding racial mistreatment and injustice. Educators cannot adequately teach students about the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre, the Trail of Tears, the Civil War, World War II, the Holocaust, or any other cultural issue throughout U.S. history by silencing courageous classroom conversations that depict a more inclusive perspective of U.S. History."
Mary Topaum, director of the American Indian Movement Indian Territory: "Denying Oklahoma students access to a diversity of experience and ideas that includes Indigenous perspectives inhibits future generations from developing the cross-cultural understanding, compassion, and mutual respect that is necessary to build bridges and thrive in our increasingly diverse state. H.B. 1775 seeks to further sanitize the few voices of historically marginalized communities that exist within the curricula and to discourage students and educators from engaging in courageous and urgently needed conversations around race, inequity, and systemic oppression."
Michael Givel, OU-AAUP president: "The wording of this H.B. 1775 directly curtails academic freedom in public universities in Oklahoma. It has a chilling effect on academic freedom as it can and has purposely targeted Oklahoma public school teachers and administrators from imparting a complete history in our schools, free from censorship or discrimination. Curriculum decisions and what is taught in a college classroom for the promotion of a balanced education is unequivocally protected from outside political requirements and interference. University professors are not sock puppets for the biased ideological agendas of elected politicians."
Sara Solfanelli, special counsel for pro bono initiatives, Schulte Roth & Zabel: "Schulte Roth & Zabel is proud to partner with the ACLU, ACLU-OK, and Lawyers' Committee to defend academic freedom, protect the fundamental right of students to learn, and ensure that schools have the freedom to create an inclusive curriculum and environment. The state-sanctioned censorship that H.B. 1775 represents was wrong a century ago when directed against the teaching of evolution, and it is just as wrong today."
This lawsuit was filed in the United States District Court for the Western District of Oklahoma.
The complaint can be found here: https://www.aclu.org/legal-document/bert-v-o-connor-complaint
The American Civil Liberties Union was founded in 1920 and is our nation's guardian of liberty. The ACLU works in the courts, legislatures and communities to defend and preserve the individual rights and liberties guaranteed to all people in this country by the Constitution and laws of the United States.
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'War Criminals': IDF Strikes Rafah After Hamas Agrees to Cease-Fire
"Why?" asked Israeli lawmaker Ofer Cassif. "Because killing Palestinians is more important for the Israeli government than saving Israelis."
May 06, 2024
Israel on Monday launched long-awaited strikes on Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip despite Hamas publicly confirming it agreed to a cease-fire and hostage release proposal from Egyptian and Qatari mediators.
The Israel Defense Forces said on social media that "the IDF is currently conducting targeted strikes against Hamas terror targets in eastern Rafah," the city to which over a million Palestinians have fled since October 7, when Israel launched a retaliatory war that has already killed at least 34,735 people in Gaza and wounded another 78,108.
Earlier Monday, the IDF had dropped leaflets directing residents and refugees in that part of Rafah to relocate to a strip along Gaza's coast, ignoring warnings from the international community and humanitarian groups that a full-scale Israeli attack on the crowded city would further endanger civilians and relief efforts.
"It is obvious Netanyahu wants this genocidal war to continue indefinitely so that he can remain in power."
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Along with the prime minister, Israel's War Cabinet includes Defense Minister Yoav Gallant and Benny Gantz, former IDF chief of the general staff, along with three observers.
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Reutersreported that "an Israeli official said the deal was not acceptable to Israel because terms had been 'softened.'"
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Council on American-Islamic Relations national executive director Nihad Awad issued a similar call Monday evening, warning that "the Israeli government is hellbent on using American financial, military, and diplomatic support to ethnically cleanse what remains of Gaza and commit another massacre."
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Trita Parsi, executive vice president of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, also suggested that the Israeli prime minister wants the bloodshed in Gaza to continue for personal reasons.
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The Pulitzer Prize Board avoided "naming the brave Palestinian journalists who did the reporting and filming and died in record numbers," said one journalist.
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In recent years, the Pulitzer Prize Board has given special recognition to the journalists of Ukraine and Afghanistan for reporting from war zones, honoring their "courage, endurance, and commitment to truthful reporting" and their ability to tell their communities' stories under "profoundly tragic and complicated circumstances."
On Monday, no such recognition was given to Palestinian reporters in Gaza, at least 92 of whom have been among more than 34,000 Palestinians killed in the enclave since Israel began its bombardment in October.
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This year, said Intercept journalist Jeremy Scahill, giving a special citation to "'media workers covering the war in Gaza' is a way to avoid naming the brave Palestinian journalists who did the reporting and filming and died in record numbers."
Many of those killed, Scahill added, might not have been had it not been for U.S.-made weapons sold to Israel.
The Pulitzer Prize for international reporting was awarded to The New York Times "for its wide-ranging and revelatory coverage of Hamas' lethal attack in southern Israel on October 7, Israel's intelligence failures, and the Israeli military's sweeping, deadly response in Gaza."
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The Vermont independent condemned the United States' support of Israel in a speech announcing his Senate reelection campaign.
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The senator made his latest demand for an end to Israel's U.S.-backed assault on Gaza hours after the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) initiated a forced evacuation of about 100,000 people in eastern Rafah, dropping leaflets that ordered displaced families to move to a strip of land along Gaza's coast. An estimated 600,000 children are among the city's current population.
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Late last month Biden signed a foreign aid package that included $17 billion for Israel's military—legislation that Sanders voted against.
Sanders reiterated his demand for Biden to end his support for the IDF as he announced his 2024 reelection campaign.
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