A federal appeals court has rejected a bid by the DeSantis administration and Florida university officials to overturn a temporary restraining order on provisions of the state’s Individual Freedom Act.
Better known as the “Stop WOKE Act,” the measure placed restrictions on the teaching of concepts involving race and gender in higher education. Specifically, it aimed to ban unobjective discussions of any concept that sees one race as morally superior to members of another race, according to court documents filed by members of the Florida Board of Governors of the State University System.
U.S. District Judge Mark Walker initially put the restraining order in place, calling the law dystopian and something out of the novel “1984.” But the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals on March 16 rejected the appellants’ motion for a stay on the restraining order pending the full outcome of the case in the appeals court.
“The court did not rule on the merits of our appeal,” Bryan Griffin, Gov. Ron DeSantis’ press secretary, told the Florida Record in an email. “The appeal is ongoing, and we remain confident that the law is constitutional.”
The groups representing the educator-plaintiffs who challenged the law, including the NAACP Legal Defense Fund and the ACLU of Florida, welcomed the 11th Circuit ruling, calling it a recognition of the harm the law places on educators.
“All students and educators deserve to have a free and open exchange about issues related to race in our classrooms – not censored discussions that erase the history of discrimination and lived experiences of Black and Brown people, women and girls, and LGBTQ+ individuals,” Leah Watson, a senior staff attorney with the ACLU Racial Justice Program, said in a prepared statement.
The university instructors’ original lawsuit challenging key provisions of the Individual Freedom Act contends the law violates the First and 14th Amendments and says that it violates the Constitution’s equal protection clause because the measure was put in place with an intent to discriminate against African-American students and educators.