First Amendment
Transgender teacher likely to fail in First Amendment challenge to Florida pronouns law, 11th Circuit says
A federal appeals court has ruled against a teacher who challenged a Florida law barring K-12 public school employees from communicating their preferred pronouns to students in the classroom if they don’t comport with their sex assigned at birth. (Image from Shutterstock)
A federal appeals court has ruled against a teacher who challenged a Florida law barring K-12 public school employees from communicating their preferred pronouns to students in the classroom if they don’t comport with their sex assigned at birth.
In a 2-1 decision July 2, the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals at Atlanta ruled that teacher Katie Wood would likely fail in her free speech challenge under the First Amendment.
Publications with coverage include the Volokh Conspiracy (here and here), the News Service of Florida (in a story published by WUSF and noted on How Appealing), Law & Crime and the Florida Phoenix.
Wood is a transgender woman who uses female pronouns. She teaches algebra at the Lennard High School in Hillsborough County in Ruskin, Florida, the articles report.
The appeals court said Wood was acting as a government employee, rather than a private citizen, when she communicated her personal pronouns verbally, on her whiteboard, on syllabi and on a “she/her” pin that she wore. Teachers are government employees paid to speak on the government’s behalf and convey its intended messages, the 11th Circuit said.
The majority distinguished the U.S. Supreme Court’s June 2022 decision in Kennedy v. Bremerton School District, which held that a football coach had a First Amendment right to pray on the field after high school football games. The coach was protected because he was not on duty and was acting as a private citizen while praying, the 11th Circuit said.
Wood, however, communicated her personal pronouns to students in the classroom and “was very much on the clock, discharging the very obligation the state had hired her to discharge,” the appeals court said.
11th Circuit Judge Kevin Newsom wrote the majority opinion, joined by Judge Andrew Brasher. Both are appointees of President Donald Trump during his first term.
The dissent argued that the law amounts to unconstitutional viewpoint discrimination. The law “has nothing to do with curriculum and everything to do with Florida attempting to silence those with whom it disagrees on the matter of transgender identity and status,” wrote Judge Adalberto Jordan, an appointee of former President Barack Obama.
The case is Wood v. Florida Department of Education.
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