Tag: Court

  • Federal Court Orders Reinstatement of Southern Education Foundation Grant After DEI Controversy

    Federal Court Orders Reinstatement of Southern Education Foundation Grant After DEI Controversy

    Raymond PierceThe Southern Education Foundation has secured a significant legal victory in its fight against the U.S. Department of Education, with a federal judge ordering the reinstatement of a key grant that was terminated earlier this year over allegations of illegal diversity, equity, and inclusion practices.

    On May 21, 2025, a judge in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia granted SEF’s motion for preliminary injunction, ordering the Department of Education to restore the organization’s Equity Assistance Center-South grant and reimburse all outstanding expenses. The grant, which had been terminated on February 13, 2025, enables SEF to provide technical assistance to public school districts and state agencies across 11 Southern states to help them comply with federal civil rights law.

    The court’s ruling was particularly pointed in its criticism of the Education Department’s decision to terminate the grant. 

    “In view of the history of race in America and the mission of SEF since the Civil War, the audacity of terminating its grants based on ‘DEI’ concerns is truly breathtaking,” the judge wrote in the opinion.

    The Southern Education Foundation, which has operated for more than 150 years with a mission to advance educational opportunities for Black students in the South, traces its origins to the late 1800s when it supported education for individuals recently emancipated from enslavement. The organization’s Equity Assistance Center represents a continuation of work that began with the original Desegregation Assistance Centers.

    “We are pleased with the Department of Education’s compliance with the court order by reinstating our grant,” said SEF President and CEO Raymond Pierce. “With the grant reinstated, SEF can move forward with developing the assistance needed to free school districts from policies and practices that remain from the dark era of lawful segregation which continue to hinder equal education opportunity for far too many children.”

    The preliminary injunction provides temporary relief while the case proceeds through the courts. The judge found that SEF was likely to succeed on the merits of its claim that the Department violated federal law in terminating the grant. However, the reinstatement is not yet permanent, pending the outcome of the full legal proceedings.

    The case highlights ongoing tensions around diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives in education, particularly as they relate to organizations with deep historical roots in civil rights work. The Southern Education Foundation’s century-and-a-half commitment to educational equity predates modern DEI terminology by decades, making the Department’s allegations particularly contentious.

    The EAC-South serves a critical function in the region, providing technical assistance to help school districts navigate complex federal civil rights requirements. This support is particularly vital in states with histories of legal segregation, where legacy policies and practices can continue to create barriers to equal educational opportunity.

    The reinstatement allows SEF to resume its work immediately, though the organization will be watching closely as the legal case progresses. The preliminary nature of the court’s order means that while SEF can continue operating the program, the long-term resolution of the dispute remains uncertain.

    The case represents a broader debate about the role of equity-focused programming in education and the extent to which federal agencies can regulate or restrict such work. For the Southern Education Foundation, the stakes extend beyond a single grant to encompass the organization’s fundamental mission and its ability to continue serving communities that have historically faced educational inequities.

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  • Supreme Court rejects case over ‘Two genders’ shirt ban, threatening student speech across New England

    Supreme Court rejects case over ‘Two genders’ shirt ban, threatening student speech across New England

    The Supreme Court just declined to review a case that threatens freedom of speech for over a million students across New England. In thousands of public schools, administrators now have power to silence student speech they dislike.

    Last year, the First Circuit Court of Appeals significantly weakened student speech rights in L.M. v. Town of Middleborough. The case involved a Massachusetts middle schooler named Liam Morrison who was banned from class for wearing a shirt that read, “There are only two genders.” When he taped “CENSORED” over the original message, the school banned that, too.

    Morrison’s school encourages students to express the view that there are many genders, but when he offered a contrary view — the school silenced him. However, if schools want to teach gender identity to seventh graders, the law says they must tolerate dissenting views on the issue. As the Supreme Court famously held in Police Dept. of Chicago v. Mosley, “above all else, the First Amendment means that government has no power to restrict expression because of its message, its ideas, its subject matter, or its content.”

    The prohibition on viewpoint-based censorship is a cornerstone of our First Amendment. Without it, the concept of free speech loses much of its meaning. Yet when Morrison and his parents, represented by the Alliance Defending Freedom, brought suit against the school and the town of Middleborough for violating his freedom of speech, the First Circuit disregarded settled First Amendment law to uphold the school’s censorship. Specifically, the First Circuit misapplied the Supreme Court’s landmark 1969 student speech case Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School Dist., which established the baseline rule that students do not “shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gate.”

    According to Tinker, schools cannot censor student speech absent evidence that doing so is “necessary” to avoid “material and substantial interference with schoolwork or discipline” or “invasion of the rights of others.” A few years ago, the Court reaffirmed the Tinker standard and emphasized that it’s a “demanding” one.

    But the First Circuit’s recent decision lowers that bar, replacing Tinker’s “substantial interference” test with a far more permissive one. Now, in thousands of public schools across Rhode Island, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Maine, and Puerto Rico, student speech that is “reasonably interpreted” to “demean personal characteristics” and thus “reasonably forecasted to poison the educational atmosphere” can be censored even if it doesn’t target any particular student. 

    That isn’t just a bad ruling. It’s a dangerous one.

    It distorts Tinker’s long-established standard and gives school administrators enormous power to silence unpopular student opinions. In doing so, it elevates disagreement to the level of “disruption” — and permits those experiencing the “discomfort and unpleasantness that always accompany an unpopular viewpoint” to silence dissenters in ways that directly contradict Tinker.

    The Supreme Court could have reviewed the First Circuit’s problematic decision and put it to rest. Instead, it looked the other way, leaving the lower court’s decision to remain on the books.

    That is quite a blow to student speech rights. As the Supreme Court recently said in Mahanoy Area School District v. B.L., “America’s public schools are the nurseries of democracy.” 

    Unfortunately, the First Circuit’s decision sends a very different message — and the Supreme Court has failed to set the record straight. 

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  • The Supreme Court made your rights harder to defend — Congress must now step up

    The Supreme Court made your rights harder to defend — Congress must now step up

    This essay was originally published in The Hill on May 8, 2025.

    From free speech rights and desegregation to gun rights and religious freedoms, civil rights litigation has long been a cornerstone of personal liberty in America. But in February, the Supreme Court issued an opinion that will make it harder for us as Americans to vindicate our constitutional rights when the government violates them.

    In Lackey v. Stinnie, a group of Virginia drivers challenged a state law that punished people for failing to pay court fees by automatically suspending their driver’s licenses. The plaintiffs secured a preliminary injunction — a court order issued early in a case to prevent potential harm while it is litigated in full — allowing them to keep their licenses. Virginia did not appeal that ruling, and before the case went to trial, the legislature changed the law and reinstated any licenses that had been suspended under it.

    In cases alleging violations of constitutional rights, a federal statute preempts the general rule that litigants pay their own fees and costs by allowing “prevailing” parties to recover attorney’s fees from the government actor who violated their rights. But in this case, the federal district court held the drivers had not in fact “prevailed” given that the case did not progress to a final conclusion, making them ineligible to recover attorney’s fees. This flew in the face of what courts and litigators had understood the law to be for decades.

    The case eventually made its way to the Supreme Court to determine what “prevailing” meant in federal law and whether the drivers were entitled to reimbursement. The court, to the disappointment of advocates for civil rights and liberties, held that plaintiffs who do not obtain a final judgment on the merits do not qualify as “prevailing” even if, as with the Virginia drivers, they prevail in getting the government to change the law. 

    Unlike corporate litigation, civil rights cases rarely involve large financial recoveries. In any event, plaintiffs often seek changes to laws or policies rather than monetary gain. Yet these are vital cases, not just for the individuals involved but for the communities they represent, even if they rarely provide enough financial incentive to make private representation feasible — unless attorneys receive compensation after winning the case.

    Congress intended to encourage civil rights litigation by tying fee awards to success, whether through final judgments or preliminary relief. The House Judiciary Committee report on the legislation enacting the attorney’s fees provision noted, “a defendant might voluntarily cease the unlawful practice. A court should still award fees even though it might conclude … that no formal relief, such as an injunction, is needed.” Despite this clear evidence of congressional intent, the court held otherwise.

    Importantly, as the court pointed out, Congress has the power to clarify in the statute that attorney’s fees can be awarded before a final judgement on the merits. Congress must do so. 

    The breadth of amicus briefs submitted in this case — from the ACLU to the Alliance Defending Freedom to the Firearms Policy Coalition — demonstrates that across the ideological spectrum, organizations recognize the critical role awarding attorney’s fees plays in civil rights litigation. 

    As FIRE noted in its amicus brief to the Supreme Court, “Withholding attorney’s fees from victims of these First Amendment violations would be devastating — not just for them individually, but for access to justice more broadly.”

    Congress must enact a simple, clarifying change that will have broad support and ensure all Americans can vindicate their constitutional rights. Justice isn’t free, but we can ensure it remains accessible to all.

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  • Charles Negy was fired over a tweet — now he’s having his day in court

    Charles Negy was fired over a tweet — now he’s having his day in court

    In the summer of 2020, two issues dominated the headlines: the COVID pandemic and the widespread unrest surrounding George Floyd, Black Lives Matter, and the “racial reckoning.” It was in this environment, with the country also at or near the apex of “cancel culture,” that the University of Central Florida tried to fire associate professor of psychology Charles Negy for his tweets about race and society. Negy fought back and sued.

    Five years later, his lawsuit continues — and last week, it brought good news not just for Professor Negy but for everyone who cares about free speech on campus.

    Last week, Judge Carlos E. Mendoza of the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida ruled that Negy’s lawsuit could proceed against four of the five administrators he sued. Importantly, the court denied claims of qualified immunity, a doctrine that says public officials aren’t liable for unconstitutional activity unless they knew or should have known their actions were unconstitutional. By denying qualified immunity to UCF’s administrators, Judge Mendoza formally recognized what was obvious from the very beginning: UCF knew or should have known that what it was doing violated the First Amendment, but they went ahead and did it anyway.

    (As a note, Negy is represented by Samantha Harris, a former FIRE colleague, which is how I learned about his case a few years ago.)

    Negy was fired for his speech, then re-instated by an arbitrator

    In the summer of 2020, Negy posted a series of tweets (since deleted) commenting on race and society. (For example, on June 3, 2020, he tweeted: “Black privilege is real: Besides affirm. action, special scholarships and other set asides, being shielded from legitimate criticism is a privilege.”)

    After some students complained to the school about Negy’s tweets, UCF responded by soliciting further complaints about him. That led to the opening of an investigation into Negy’s classroom speech as well. Seven months later, what began as an investigation of tweets led to 300 interviews; which led to a (get ready for this) 244-page report. As I wrote at the time, the report made absolute hash of academic freedom with what struck me as nonsensical lines drawn between speech it believed to be protected and unprotected: 

    According to the UCF investigation, it is protected speech to say that girl scouts preserve their virginity (p. 25), but not that women are attracted to men with money (p. 26). It is protected speech to say that Jesus was schizophrenic (p. 36), but unprotected to say that Jesus did not come into the world to die for everyone’s sins (p. 36). It’s protected to say that Islam is cruel and not a religion of peace (p. 107) but not that it is a toxic mythology (p. 35).

    Based on the report, in January 2021, UCF administrators decided to fire Negy without providing a normally required six-month notice period — allegedly because he was a “safety risk.” (Caution: Dangerous Tweets!) Unsurprisingly, in May of 2022, an arbitrator ordered him re-instated, citing a lack of due process. And as I pointed out then: 

    UCF’s case against Negy was never likely to survive first-contact with a neutral decision-maker. When an investigation of tweets includes incidents from 2005 — the year before Twitter was founded — either the investigator is lying about their purpose or confused about the linear nature of time.

    In 2023, Negy sued the institution and five individuals who had been involved in the UCF decision. Some of Negy’s claims were dismissed last year; the recent ruling was on motions for summary judgment on the remaining claims. 

    Why claims only went forward against four out of five defendants

    Last week’s ruling involved two causes of action. The first is a First Amendment retaliation claim against five individual defendants. First Amendment retaliation is basically just what it sounds like: a government employee retaliating against an individual for his or her protected speech. In Negy’s case, his claim is that certain UCF employees didn’t like his tweets, and decided to fire him for those tweets — with everything in-between, including the investigation and report, motivated by the desire to punish him for using his First Amendment rights on the Internet.

    The second cause of action is against one particular UCF employee — the employee who was in charge of writing the report — alleging a direct First Amendment violation. Again, that’s just what it sounds like: a government official censoring Negy’s protected expression. Negy argued UCF’s report claimed that several instances of Negy’s in-classroom speech amounted to discriminatory harassment, when his speech was actually protected by the First Amendment as an exercise of academic freedom. In other words, Negy claimed that the UCF employee violated his First Amendment rights by telling decision-makers that Negy’s speech wasn’t protected. 

    To understand the judge’s ruling, it’ll be helpful to be able to refer to the defendants by something more than pronouns. Let’s meet them!

    The first three were joint decision-makers about what to do with the investigation results. They are: 

    • Alexander Cartwright, the president of UCF.
      • FUN FACT: While this case was pending, Cartwright received a 20% pay raise, giving him a base salary of $900,000 and potential total compensation of $1.275 million.
      • QUOTE: As quoted in the opinion, Cartwright responded to demands that Negy be immediately fired with: “Sometimes we have to go through a process, as frustrating as … that process is to me.” When asked, Cartwright could not recall what was frustrating about the process.
    • Michael Johnson, UCF’s provost and executive vice president for academic affairs.
      • FUN FACT: After 35 years at UCF, Johnson announced his retirement last month.
      • QUOTE:  Johnson publicly condemned Negy’s tweets the day the investigation started. At a 2022 arbitration hearing, Johnson said Negy was “dangerous” and that “[w]e didn’t see any way to put him safely in a classroom situation again.” Johnson was apparently so unconvincing that the arbitrator re-instated Negy anyway.
    • Tosha Dupras, who was at the time the interim dean of UCF’s College of Sciences. Dupras issued the notice of termination.
      • FUN FACT: Since 2022, this native of Canada has been dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at Texas Tech.
      • QUOTE: When responding to an email calling for Negy’s removal from the classroom long before the investigation was complete, Dupras said: “I agree with the thoughts you have expressed in [y]our email.”  

    Two others had different roles, but were not directly the decision-makers:

    • Nancy Fitzpatrick Myers, then the director of UCF’s Office of Institutional Equity. Myers ran the investigation.
      • FUN FACT: Since 2024, attorney Myers has been director of Yale’s University-Wide Committee on Sexual Misconduct.
      • QUOTE: From the opinion: “Although Myers stated that OIE performed an independent credibility assessment for the witness statements, she noted that the results were not written down and that it ‘was something [she] was assessing as [she] went through the record.’”
    • S. Kent Butler, who at the time was UCF’s interim chief Equity, Inclusion and Diversity officer, and is now a professor of counselor education. Butler, Cartwright, and Johnson put out the initial statement soliciting complaints about Negy.
      • FUN FACT: Butler did crisis management work in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina.
      • QUOTE: Less than 24 hours after the start of the investigation, an incoming freshman asked Butler what would happen to Negy. Butler responded: “The wheels are in motion … [B]elieve that by the time you get on the campus as a freshman, it will have been dealt with.” 

    A brief summary of their roles in Negy’s firing, at least as described in the court’s opinion (I wasn’t there, after all): 

    • Cartwright, Johnson, and Butler issued UCF’s initial statement about Negy, which invited people to submit complaints about him.
    • Myers wrote and submitted the 244-page report to Negy’s supervisor (not a party to this action), who then recommended Negy’s termination.
    • Cartwright, Johnson, and Dupras made the decision to terminate Negy. 

    The court granted Butler’s motion for summary judgment, deciding that Butler wasn’t at any point in the process a decision-maker. If Butler wasn’t part of the process to decide to terminate Negy, the court reasoned, then he wasn’t in a position to retaliate. I’m not sure I agree; I think putting out a press release inviting people to submit complaints could certainly create a chilling effect on speech, and therefore constitute an act of retaliation. 

    The court seems to view the termination as the only form of retaliation in question, but that isn’t how the complaint was written, which lists the statement as a form of retaliation. Sure, termination is worse, but I think that anything that would chill a person of reasonable fortitude from speaking out is potentially a form of retaliation. Having a government official multiple levels of supervision above you put out a call for complaints specifically about you would be a disincentive for most people, I’d think. But what do I know? “I’m just a caveman… your world frightens and confuses me.” 

    The court also granted Myers’ summary judgment motion on the second claim for direct censorship, ruling that the right to academic freedom over in-class speech has not been clearly established in the Eleventh Circuit. Negy had precedent from other circuits, but not this circuit, to show that in-classroom speech was entitled to some level of academic freedom. The court here is indeed bound by bad circuit precedent. The Supreme Court needs to fix this doctrine at some point. 

    Nevertheless, let’s move on… 

    The court rejects the qualified immunity defense for the retaliation claims

    The remaining defendants argued they were entitled to qualified immunity, specifically arguing that Negy could not show he was terminated for his tweets. After all, in a vacuum, at no point did any of them say, “You, sir, have the wrong opinions on the Internet, and therefore you must fly from us. Begone!” Instead, there was a long investigation that found lots of things they didn’t like about what he said in the classroom. So their argument, in a nutshell, was that there’s no causality here. Where’s the smoking gun? 

    Negy’s response was that there was no observable “smoking gun” because the entire process was a smokescreen, and the decision to terminate him was effectively made by the time they announced the investigation. (Duh.) Because this was a motion for summary judgment made by the defendants, Negy only had to show the possibility that he could prove it at trial, and so he provided evidence that suggested the decision-makers had a preordained outcome in mind.

    Scroll back and read the quotes in the mini-bios above. The court found that a reasonable jury could determine, given this and more evidence like it, that the investigation was a pretense. 

    There’s a second way the defendants could have gotten qualified immunity: by showing they’d have made the decision to fire Negy even if he hadn’t tweeted those statements, on the basis of the things reflected in the report. But the argument that they would’ve fired Negy for his classroom speech alone faced an awfully big hurdle: their 15 years of deciding not to do that. It wasn’t like Negy woke up one morning in 2020 after a lifetime of milquetoast platitudes and chose rhetorical violence. 

    From following this case, it seems to me that Negy’s entire career has been what I’d describe as punk rock pedagogy: he didn’t care if you loved it or hated it, as long as you remembered the show. There is an argument that the pursuit of truth is enhanced by that kind of teaching — a darned good one given how many of us have experienced it at one time or another. All of our interactions are balances between our honest opinions and what we can say within the bounds of society. There is only one human being I genuinely believe was so intrinsically good that his unfiltered views were socially acceptable to everyone, and Fred Rogers isn’t with us anymore. The rest of us are wearing masks at least some of the time, and letting those masks slip to study our real thoughts is something we might want to allow in a psychology classroom. 

    The court also noted that the purpose of qualified immunity was to avoid liability for unsophisticated decision-makers or decisions that had to be made on-the-spot, where the decision-maker wasn’t in a position to know what they did was unlawful. (The paradigmatic example is that of a police officer who has to make a split-second decision.) The court rejected that rationale: “Defendants had ample time to make reasoned, thoughtful decisions regarding how they wished to proceed with the investigation. Moreover, they had the benefit of making those decisions with counsel.” At some point, while writing their 244-page report, perhaps one of them might have considered the law? (FIRE has pushed this argument before.)

    You stop that censorship right meow

    The excessively logical among you might well be asking: If (diversity officer) Butler’s motion for summary judgment on the retaliation claim was granted because he wasn’t a decision-maker, and (investigator) Myers also wasn’t a decision-maker, why wasn’t Myers able to get summary judgment on the retaliation claim, too? 

    It has to do with something called the “cat’s paw” theory. The name comes from the fable of the monkey and the cat. The short, not-very-artistic version is this: A clever monkey talks a cat into reaching into a fire and pulling chestnuts out of it, promising to share them. Instead, the monkey eats the chestnuts as they come out, and all the cat gets is a burned paw. (Is it just me, or are monkeys in fables always mischievous? Where’s the decent monkey in mythology? Just once, give me the monkey who shares the chestnuts and and even brings some milk. Just once, 17th century French authors, subvert my expectations.) 

    Under the cat’s paw theory, a state actor can be liable for retaliation if they make intentionally biased recommendations to the decision-maker (who then does not independently investigate) in order to reach the desired outcome. Was this a biased investigation? My feelings on the topic are summed up in a 2021 story: 

    The entire process of preparing this report was motivated by complaints about Negy’s tweets. Nobody interviews 300 people over seven months about incidents covering 15 years unless they’re desperate to find something, anything, to use against their target. UCF’s lack of sincerity in their investigation of Negy’s tweets — which, technically, was what they were investigating, based on the spurious allegation that Negy’s offensive tweets were required reading in his classes — is reflected in their decision to investigate allegations as far back as 2005, the year before Twitter was founded.

    I’ll paws here to make clear that I don’t purr-sonally know either Negy or the Defendants. Still, based on the timeline, the purr-ported need for the investigation, and its fur-midible scope, I’m feline like Negy was purr-secuted. The meow-nifestly unfair termination, I feel, is inseparable from the hiss-tory behind the report’s creation. (Okay, I’ll stop. Sorry, I was just kitten around.)

    Institutions need to avoid overreacting to outrage 

    For Negy and the defendants (which is not the name of a punk rock band, yet), the next step is to decide if they can work this out themselves or they need a trial to look deeper into whether UCF’s decision to fire him was effectively made when the investigation started. But there’s a larger principle here that other institutions need to learn before they learn it the embarrassing way UCF has.

    Maybe, just maybe, people saying things that merely offend you isn’t that serious. Maybe having someone in your community of nearly 70,000 students and over 13,000 faculty and staff members who says things that simply offend people is not actually a sign of a dire crisis. Maybe the students who demand that level of ideological conformity are not the ones you should be trying to attract. Because maybe, if you cultivate a level of automatic groupthink that rejects the possibility of dissenting views, you will come to discover that, eventually, your administration has a dissenting view. 

    What if, instead of reacting to every declaration of witchcraft by tightening the buckles on your hats, you tried explaining that lots of things might be offensive, and if you don’t like Negy, you might have luck with one of the thousands of other professors? What if, instead of modeling the kind of purge your ideological opponents might adopt one day if, I don’t know, they were politically powerful at some point, you modeled the idea that we can cooperate across deeply-held but incompatible beliefs? 

    I don’t know much about politics, but… It would certainly be cheaper, wouldn’t it? 

    FIRE will continue to follow Negy’s case and keep you updated. 

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  • Trump administration court filing may spell end of overtime final rule

    Trump administration court filing may spell end of overtime final rule

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    U.S. Department of Justice attorneys asked the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to temporarily suspend the Labor Department’s appeals in two cases challenging its 2024 Fair Labor Standards Act overtime rule, according to an April 24 court filing.

    Texas district court judges twice blocked DOL’s final rule, which increased the minimum salary threshold for overtime pay eligibility in two steps. First, a November 2024 decision sided with plaintiffs including the state of Texas and enjoined the rule nationwide. A second judgment set aside and vacated the rule in response to a lawsuit by marketing agency Flint Avenue.

    The government asked that the 5th Circuit place its appeals in abeyance “pending the agency’s reconsideration of the rule.” It said counsel for the appellees in both cases did not oppose its request.

    The Biden administration’s effort to expand overtime eligibility to millions of U.S. workers would have pushed the annual minimum threshold under the FLSA to $58,656 in 2025 with automatic, additional increases every three years beginning in July 2027. An initial increase to $43,888 per year took effect before Texas federal judges blocked it along with the rule’s other components.

    The entire policy is almost certain to be erased by the second Trump administration, according to attorneys who previously spoke to HR Dive. Prior to the Biden-era rule, DOL had last increased the overtime-pay threshold during Trump’s first administration in 2019.

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  • Appeals Court Stays Litigation on Overtime Rule – CUPA-HR

    Appeals Court Stays Litigation on Overtime Rule – CUPA-HR

    by CUPA-HR | May 6, 2025

    On April 29, the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals issued a stay on the litigation challenging the Biden administration’s overtime rule that will last for 120 days. The order halts further proceedings in the appeals court while the Trump administration’s Department of Labor (DOL) reconsiders the Biden administration’s rule, and it directs DOL to file additional status reports every 60 days.

    In February, the Trump administration’s DOL filed an appeal on a district court’s ruling in Flint Avenue, LLC v. DOL that vacated the Biden administration’s overtime rule. The Trump appeal was the second appeal filed for cases involving the Biden overtime rule. The move to appeal was largely viewed as an attempt for the Trump administration to put a placeholder on court proceedings while Secretary of Labor Lori Chavez-DeRemer settled into her new role and figured out next steps for the overtime regulations.

    The ruling from the appeals court followed a request from Trump’s DOL to hold the case in abeyance while the agency reconsidered the rule. Further updates from the Trump administration regarding the overtime regulations are likely to follow.

    CUPA-HR will continue to monitor for updates related to the overtime regulations.



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  • Supreme Court Must Not Undermine Public Education in Religious Charter Case – The 74

    Supreme Court Must Not Undermine Public Education in Religious Charter Case – The 74


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    Last week, the Supreme Court held oral arguments in a case that could undermine public education across America. The question the court is looking to answer is whether a religious institution may run a publicly funded charter school — a move that would threaten not only the separation of church and state, but the right of every student to access free, high-quality learning.

    In 2023, Oklahoma’s Statewide Virtual Charter School Board approved St. Isidore of Seville Catholic Virtual School, an action that would make it the nation’s first-ever religious charter school. It would be governed by Catholic religious doctrine in its syllabus, operations and employment practices. It would use taxpayer dollars to pay for religious instruction. And it could turn away students and staff if their faith or identity conflict with Catholic beliefs. 

    Here’s the issue: Charter schools were created to be public schools. They are open to all students, from every background, tradition and faith community. They are publicly funded and tuition-free. And they are secular. 

    That’s not an arbitrary distinction – it’s a constitutional one, grounded in the law and embedded in charter schools’ very design. The First Amendment’s Establishment Clause bars the government from promoting or endorsing any religion through public spaces or institutions. This foundational rule has ensured that students of all backgrounds can access public schools. It does not stifle religious expression — the Constitution fully protects this freedom, and religious education is available in other venues. Personally, I was, in fact, educated at Jesuit Catholic schools for my entire academic career. 

    Parochial education has long been an accepted and important part of the education ecosystem, serving a variety of students and often filling an important need. Religiously affiliated schools have a long history of educating and caring for children who are new to this country and underserved, and supporting families who are overlooked. But promoting the exclusive teachings of a specific religion with public funds in a public school violates a clear constitutional principle. 

    The issue isn’t only a legal matter; it’s about the character of public education itself. Muddying the boundary between public and religious institutions would undercut a fundamental commitment made by the nation’s public charter schools: that they are accessible to every student. It would undermine legal protections that keep public services available to the public. 

    Rather than creating more opportunities for America’s students, it would constrict opportunities for a high-quality education, especially in states that are hostile toward charters or alternative public school models. Legislative bodies could seek to eliminate funding for all unique school types if the court decision forced them to fund religious schools operating with public dollars. This would curtail or dismantle strong independent schools, 30-year-old public charter schools and schools with unique programs designed for special populations.

    As executive director of the DC Charter School Alliance, and a long-time public charter school advocate, I’ve seen the importance of public charter schools firsthand. Here in the District of Columbia, charter schools serve nearly half of the public school students in the city. Outstanding educators from all walks of life teach a wide range of subjects with enthusiasm and expertise to prepare young people for success. Our students bring to the classroom an incredible range of experiences, including faith traditions. And every student, family and faculty member is welcome. D.C.’s charter schools reflect a core American value: the promise of a high-quality public education for all. 

    The justices of the Supreme Court face a clear and critical choice: They can bolster that promise, or they can tear it down. If the court allows a religious school to operate with public funds, there is no doubt that it will open the floodgates to other proposals across the country. Taxpayers could be forced to foot the bill for countless new and converted schools, draining resources from an already financially strapped education system. True public charter schools — the ones committed to high standards, positive results and opportunity for all — could bear the cost. And the students who rely on them could suffer. 

    Public education is one of America’s most vital institutions. It offers all children, no matter their background or beliefs, access to free, high-quality learning. Charter schools play an essential role in making that promise real. But allowing a religious school to operate with public funds turns public education into something much more restrictive, dismantling its very foundation.

    The court must reaffirm this indisputable truth: Public schools should remain public — and open to all. 


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  • Landmark New Mexico Education Equity Case Heads Back to Court Next Week – The 74

    Landmark New Mexico Education Equity Case Heads Back to Court Next Week – The 74


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    The parties in the long-running Yazzie-Martinez lawsuit over educational equity in New Mexico will meet in court next week to discuss a motion alleging the state has not complied with previous court orders, along with the plaintiffs’ request for a “remedial plan.”

    The case, originally filed in 2014, led to a finding in 2018 by the late First Judicial District Court Judge Sarah Singleton, who found that the state was not providing equitable educational opportunities to Native students, English language learners, low-income students and students with disabilities. She ordered the state to take steps to address the needs of these at-risk students and ensure schools have the resources to provide them with the education they deserve.

    Attorneys representing Louise Martinez and Wilhelmina Yazzie filed a joint motion of non-compliance in September 2024, arguing that the state has not made significant progress in addressing the needs of at-risk students. Specifically, in their motion, plaintiffs point to ongoing poor student performance; high turnover within the New Mexico Public Education Department; high teacher vacancy rates; and a lack of targeted funding for at-risk students.

    Since Singleton’s decision, the state has increased funding for public education, but students are still being overlooked, Melissa Candelaria, education director for the NM Center on Law and Poverty, which represents the plaintiffs, told Source NM.

    The motion hearing is scheduled for 9 a.m. Tuesday, April 29.

    “We believe the court’s ruling should have been a wakeup call,” Candelaria said. “Our students can’t afford more bureaucratic churn and empty promises from PED. And we believe, the plaintiffs believe, the court must step in to enforce a real community-driven plan that reflects the urgency and the gravity to improve the overall state education system.”

    Candelaria noted that the joint motion was not opposed by New Mexico Attorney General Raúl Torrez, who represents the state in the case. Court documents state that Torrez “agrees” that there has been “insufficient compliance.” However, private counsel for the PED did oppose the motion, particularly the plaintiff’s proposed remedial plan.

    PED had not responded to a request from Source NM for comment prior to publication.

    That plan, as detailed in court documents, includes nine components or goals, including: establishing a multicultural and multilingual educational framework; building an education workforce; increasing access to technology; developing methods of accountability; and strengthening the capacity of the PED.

    “There’s no longer a debate that a statewide education plan is necessary. Now, the decision is who leads that development,” Candelaria said.

    Candelaria also told Source the plaintiffs propose the Legislative Education Study Committee take the lead in developing the remedial plan because the department’s staff have knowledge and expertise in the area of education and have access to data. The department also has a director and permanent staff, as opposed to the PED, which has had multiple cabinet secretaries lead the department in the nearly seven years since Singleton’s decision, she noted.

    “Without a plan, the efforts by the Legislature will still be piecemeal and scattershot and it’s not going to result in what we want to see in a transformed education system that’s equitable and that builds on the strengths and provides for the needs of the four student groups in the case,” Candelaria said.

    The PED opposes the motion on this point, according to court documents, and argues the education department should take the lead in developing the plan. The department also says more time is needed to create and then implement the plan. Plaintiffs suggest that the five-year plan should be developed within six months of this month’s hearing.

    Wilhelmina Yazzie, one of the original plaintiffs, told Source she feels “very optimistic” ahead of the motion hearing and that she hopes the judge agrees a plan is necessary. She added that the inequities in public education were emphasized during the COVID-19 pandemic.

    “Especially our tribal communities who are really deeply impacted by that, and they still continue to suffer to the present time right now and just by the state not taking the action that we need them to take,” Yazzie said.

    Yazzie’s son, Xavier Nez, 22, was in third grade when the lawsuit started. He is now in his third year studying at the University of New Mexico. Candelaria pointed out that since the 2018 court decision, multiple classes of students have made their way through the state’s educational system and failed to receive a comprehensive education. Yazzie’s youngest child, Kimimila Black Moon, is currently in third grade but attends private school.

    “She’s not in the public school because I still haven’t seen changes,” she said.

    Yazzie told Source that another goal of hers is to get out into communities throughout the state and speak with families because many parents are still unaware of the lawsuit and “they’re the ones that firsthand know what their children need, what they’re lacking, how they’re doing in school.”

    Source New Mexico is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Source New Mexico maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Julia Goldberg for questions: info@sourcenm.com.


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  • Lawyers in New Jersey School Segregation Case Want Appellate Court to Weigh in – The 74

    Lawyers in New Jersey School Segregation Case Want Appellate Court to Weigh in – The 74


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    Attorneys representing a group of New Jersey parents and activist groups are asking a state appellate court to weigh in on a case that could reshape the state’s public education system.

    At the center of the fight is whether New Jersey schools are unconstitutionally segregated by race and socioeconomic status. A lower court judge in October 2023 acknowledged the state’s public schools are segregated by race and that the state must act, but also found that the plaintiffs had failed to prove the entire system is segregated across all its districts.

    The parents’ attorneys filed a motion last week with the state’s appellate division asking it to hear the case.

    “It is imperative that no more students be deprived of these rights by the trial court’s avoidance of the straightforward conclusion compelled by the facts and the law in this case — that the state defendants, who are legally obligated to take action to desegregate public schools regardless of the reasons for that segregation, have acted unconstitutionally by failing to do so,” the attorneys wrote in the filing.

    Gov. Phil Murphy and the state Department of Education have until April 28 to respond to the plaintiffs’ new filing. A spokesman for the Murphy administration declined to comment.

    News of the new filing was first reported by Chalkbeat Newark.

    The case dates to 2018, when the Latino Action Network, the NAACP New Jersey State Conference, and several other families and groups sued the state alleging New Jersey failed to address de facto segregation in public schools. The plaintiffs cited data showing that nearly half of all Black and Latino students in New Jersey attend schools that are more than 90% non-white, in districts that are often just blocks from predominantly white districts.

    In New Jersey, students typically attend schools in the municipality where they live. Plaintiffs argued that long-standing housing policies that led to segregated residential neighborhoods led to segregated schools also. New Jersey is the seventh-most segregated state for Black and Latino students, the plaintiffs say.

    In October 2023, after Superior Court Judge Robert Lougy issued his ruling that acknowledged racial segregation in New Jersey schools but said it was not widespread, both sides entered mediation talks in hopes it would resolve more quickly than continued litigation.

    Attorneys for the parties said in February that it’s unlikely continuing the talks would “be constructive.”

    The plaintiffs’ attorneys say the lower court’s October ruling should be reversed. They want a judge to review what they say are six errors in the 2023 order, like the fact that Lougy did not identify a disputed fact.

    “Rather than reach the only logical conclusion that followed — that the state defendants violated plaintiffs’ constitutional rights — the trial court left the question of liability for another day,” the filing reads.

    If the appellate court denies the motion, the case would return to the trial court, or could be appealed to the state Supreme Court.

    New Jersey Monitor is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. New Jersey Monitor maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Terrence T. McDonald for questions: info@newjerseymonitor.com.


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  • Federal Court Blocks Education Department’s Diversity Directive, Marking Victory for Academic Freedom Advocates

    Federal Court Blocks Education Department’s Diversity Directive, Marking Victory for Academic Freedom Advocates


    A federal judge in New Hampshire delivered a significant legal victory Thursday for proponents of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs in education by granting a preliminary injunction against the U.S. Department of Education’s controversial February “Dear Colleague” letter that critics had denounced as an unprecedented attempt to restrict DEI initiatives nationwide.

    The ruling temporarily blocks the Education Department from enforcing its February 14, 2025, directive against the plaintiffs, their members, and affiliated organizations while litigation continues. The court determined the directive potentially contradicts established legal protections for academic freedom and may violate constitutional rights by imposing vague restrictions on curriculum and programming.

    The February directive had sent shockwaves through higher education institutions across the country, with many administrators and faculty expressing concern that their diversity programs could trigger federal funding cutoffs. According to court documents, some educators reported feeling targeted by what they characterized as a “witch hunt” that put their jobs and teaching credentials at risk.

    “Today’s ruling allows educators and schools to continue to be guided by what’s best for students, not by the threat of illegal restrictions and punishment,” said National Education Association President Becky Pringle in a statement following the decision. She further criticized the directive as part of broader “politically motivated attacks” designed to “stifle speech and erase critical lessons” in public education.

    The coalition of plaintiffs who filed the lawsuit on March 5 includes the National Education Association (NEA), NEA-New Hampshire, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), ACLU of New Hampshire, ACLU of Massachusetts, and the Center for Black Educator Development.

    Sharif El-Mekki, CEO and founder of the Center for Black Educator Development, emphasized the significance of the ruling beyond its immediate legal implications. “While this interim agreement does not confirm the Department’s motives, we believe it should mark the beginning of a permanent withdrawal from the assault on teaching and learning,” he said. “The Department’s attempt to punish schools for acknowledging diversity, equity and inclusion is not only unconstitutional, but it’s also extremely dangerous — and functions as a direct misalignment with what we know to be just and future forward.”

    Education legal experts note that the case represents a critical battleground in the ongoing national debate about how issues of race, identity, and structural inequality should be addressed in educational settings. The preliminary injunction suggests the court found merit in the plaintiffs’ arguments that the Education Department overstepped its authority and potentially violated First Amendment protections.

    Sarah Hinger, deputy director of the ACLU Racial Justice Program, called the ruling “a victory for students, educators, and the fundamental principles of academic freedom,” adding that “every student deserves an education that reflects the full diversity of our society, free from political interference.”

    The lawsuit challenges the directive on multiple legal grounds, including violations of due process and First Amendment rights, limitations on academic freedom, and exceeding the department’s legal mandate by dictating curriculum content. The plaintiffs argue that the directive created a chilling effect on legitimate educational activities while imposing vague standards that left educators uncertain about compliance requirements.

    Gilles Bissonnette, legal director of the ACLU of New Hampshire, emphasized the importance of the ruling for educational inclusivity. “The court’s ruling today is a victory for academic freedom, the free speech rights of educators, and for New Hampshire students who have a right to an inclusive education free from censorship,” he said. “Every student, both in the Granite State and across the country, deserves to feel seen, heard, and connected in school – and that can’t happen when classroom censorship laws and policies are allowed to stand.”

    The injunction comes at a time when many colleges and universities have been reassessing their diversity initiatives amid increased public scrutiny and policy debates. Higher education institutions have expressed particular concern about maintaining both compliance with federal regulations and their commitments to creating inclusive learning environments.

    The Department of Education has not issued a public response to the court’s decision. The case will now proceed to further litigation as the court considers whether to permanently block the directive.

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