Summary
- Federal judge orders Pentagon to restore removed books, curriculum.
- Books and lessons removed due to Trump’s anti-wokeness efforts.
- Order applies to five military-connected schools worldwide.
Six military families who were upset with the actions at schools under the Department of Defense Education Activity, or DoDEA, in the weeks following President Donald Trump's inauguration filed a lawsuit against the Department of Defense in April on behalf of the American Civil Liberties Union.
At DoDEA facilities in the US and 11 other countries, about 67,000 students take classes.
The October 20 order by U.S. District Judge Patricia Tolliver Giles only pertains to a preliminary injunction that the ACLU obtained in May; therefore, it remains in effect while the action is ongoing.
In addition to being prohibited from making any "further removals," the Department was mandated to "immediately restore the library books and curricular materials" that had been taken out since January 19.
The public release of the list of over 600 books impacted by the department's actions was previously mandated by Tolliver Giles.
"Being Jazz: My Life as a (Transgender) Teen" by Jazz Jennings, "A is for Activist" by Innosanto Nagara, and "From #BlackLivesMatter to Black Liberation" by Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor were among them.
The Oct. 20 verdict was referred to as an "important victory" by the ACLU.
“The censorship taking place in DoDEA schools as a result of these executive orders was astonishing in its scope and scale, and we couldn’t be more pleased that the court has vindicated the First Amendment rights of the students this has impacted,”
ACLU senior staff attorney Emerson Sykes said.
Jessica Henninger, a mother of DoDEA children who previously told USA TODAY that she felt "helpless" in the face of the changes due to the agency's operation by the Department of Defense which the Trump administration dubbed the Department of War, was one of the plaintiffs.
What legal basis did the judge cite for the ruling?
The judge in the ruling ordering the Pentagon to restore removed books cited the legal base primarily predicated in First Amendment protections against standpoint demarcation and previous restraint. The judge emphasized that the government may not act to deny access to an idea simply because state officers disapprove of that idea for prejudiced or political reasons.
The ruling underlined that indeed government- run institutions like military libraries can not suppress content simply due to political or ideological objections. This protection extends to access to different materials on race, gender, and history that had been removed by the Pentagon.
Thus, the legal base is grounded on the principle that the First Amendment forbids suppression by government actors motivated by disagreement with political or social dispatches in books.