Professors push back on state argument that professor speech is government speech

After a hearing last week where the state argued that public university professors’ speech is government speech, the professor plaintiffs in the case to overturn the Intellectual Freedom, or Stop WOKE Act, are pushing back.

Jennifer Sandoval, a communications professor at the University of Central Florida, said many of her colleagues have already changed their curriculum despite the law being enjoined.

“It is not just limiting what I can talk about,” said Sandoval, speaking during a virtual news conference on Monday, “but actually now saying that the state can be the deciding factor. So it’s very clear to me that there are some things here that we can talk about as long as they are popular with certain folks and power in the state. And that’s just not at all why I became a professor.”

The discussion followed events last week in a legal battle that began with passage of the law in 2022.

The law forbids educators from promoting concepts that make anyone feel “guilt, anguish or other psychological distress” related to race, color, national origin or sex because of actions “committed in the past.” U.S. District Judge Mark Walker called the law “positively dystopian” by when he ruled in 2022 that it could not be enforced as it applied to higher education.

Lawyers for the state argued to a panel of judges on Friday at the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Miami that they should overturn Walker’s injunction.

The state’s lawyers argued that because professors are government employees, “the government can restrict professors on a content-wide basis and they can restrict them from offering viewpoints that are contrary.”

If they didn’t wish to comply with Florida’s rules, lawyers argued the professors could leave for other states “friendlier to their viewpoints.”

The professors who spoke on Monday are plaintiffs represented by the American Civil Liberties Union.

Leroy Pernell, a law professor at Florida A&M University, said the state’s arguments strip professors of their First Amendment speech rights.

“This type of approach is something we don’t associate with a free country,” he said. “This shouldn’t be expected in an educational system. It’s been pointed out that this isn’t consistent with the the academic accreditation standards of virtually every discipline.”

He added he was troubled by “the notion that if you don’t like it, leave.”

Sharon Austin, a political science professor at the University of Florida said she was asked to develop a course on race in 2020, following the killing of George Floyd. For 32 years, she said, she’s taught courses that deal with race.

“Professors who teach courses about race, like myself and the other professors who are on this call, are going to be more likely to be targeted by this, because I think that the Legislature doesn’t really understand the way things work in academia,” she said.

A ruling isn’t expected for months.