Educators Feel Free Speech Fallout From Kirk Killing: What’s Appropriate, Who Decides?

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spk_0 To make our students feel safe, he needs to be removed.

spk_0 The school said that he's now on paid administrative leave.

spk_0 Is that enough?

spk_0 No, it's not the president that you can say whatever you are on the internet,

spk_0 nothing will ever happen.

spk_0 You cannot in one bracket say that you should have the freedom to say those things

spk_0 and then take away people's livelihoods because they do not agree with you

spk_0 about a man, not a political leader, not a politician.

spk_0 Welcome back to Ed Quake 2025, making sense of our rapidly changing profession.

spk_0 Let's dig into a really difficult topic today.

spk_0 The assassination of conservative activists Charlie Kirk

spk_0 and the immediate fallout for teachers across the country.

spk_0 Yeah, it's raised some huge questions.

spk_0 The big one really is where exactly is the line between a teacher's free speech

spk_0 on their personal social media and their professional duties.

spk_0 And when does that comment on your personal page across the line and become

spk_0 you know, a firing offense?

spk_0 That's the tightrope.

spk_0 So many people are walking out.

spk_0 It feels like the space between private thoughts and professional fallout

spk_0 is shrinking fast.

spk_0 Right.

spk_0 Educators across the country are filing lawsuits, alleging they were unlawfully fired

spk_0 for their comments about Charlie Kirk's assassination.

spk_0 So when you see someone celebrating Charlie's murder,

spk_0 call them out and hell call their employer.

spk_0 What legal rights and protections do teachers and school leaders actually have here?

spk_0 Yeah, and it's essential to get this.

spk_0 Yeah, this isn't just theoretical talk.

spk_0 It's really high stakes.

spk_0 We're seeing teachers fired licenses potentially pulled.

spk_0 It's critical stuff for everyone connected to schools.

spk_0 Because it really shows how fast personal opinions online can affect jobs,

spk_0 safety, even the whole learning environment.

spk_0 Yeah, it's been all over the news.

spk_0 That's for sure.

spk_0 We're looking at analysis from Education Week, the 74.

spk_0 And broadcast news coverage from all over the nation.

spk_0 OK, so let's get the basic facts straight.

spk_0 Charlie Kirk, 31 years old, founder of Turning Point USA,

spk_0 he was shot and killed September 10th on a college campus in Utah.

spk_0 That's right.

spk_0 And authorities charged the suspect pretty quickly.

spk_0 They stated the motive seemed related to Kirk's political expression

spk_0 according to reports in the 74.

spk_0 And the reaction from school systems, it was incredibly swift.

spk_0 Education Week is reporting that across the country,

spk_0 at least 10 teachers and staff members have been fired or resigned and get this.

spk_0 Over 50 more have been investigated.

spk_0 Wow, 10 firings.

spk_0 That's an incredibly fast administrative response.

spk_0 And these posts were all over the map.

spk_0 You had an Iowa teacher reportedly put on leave for posting one Nazi down.

spk_0 Yeah, and a South Carolina teacher who's apparently no longer employed

spk_0 posted something like America became greater today.

spk_0 Then there was a Georgia teacher writing comments suggesting Kirk's death

spk_0 was tied to the second amendment.

spk_0 Right.

spk_0 WSB TV covered that.

spk_0 And in Wisconsin, a school employee wrote,

spk_0 karma is rough and use some internet acronym about consequences.

spk_0 CBS 58 reported on that one.

spk_0 So you see this range now.

spk_0 How did schools officially react?

spk_0 What was their reasoning for the discipline?

spk_0 Well, superintendents and state officials,

spk_0 they leaned heavily on this idea of substantial material disruption.

spk_0 Once Atlanta school superintendent Chris Ragsdale started getting calls

spk_0 from parents concerned about the safety of their kids, he had to take action.

spk_0 We can really have no room for employees of a school district

spk_0 to be here who are seen as condoning, supporting,

spk_0 shearing for a school shooter and the murder of an innocent man on the school campus.

spk_0 So that fear that community outcry becomes the justification.

spk_0 Right.

spk_0 It's less about the specific politics of the comment

spk_0 and more about the fallout, the perceived threat to the school environment.

spk_0 And the teachers union, the Cobb County Association of Educators, they weighed in too.

spk_0 They did led by Jeff Hobard.

spk_0 They sent out a letter and it wasn't really about First Amendment law.

spk_0 It was more practical advice, kind of a warning.

spk_0 Please be cognizant of what you say, both on duty and off duty.

spk_0 Anything that could be considered to be unprofessional in regards to social media

spk_0 can bring possible consequences or discipline to an individual.

spk_0 Even if it's on your personal page, got it.

spk_0 So even off duty speech is sackable.

spk_0 And it has to be a while a substantial disruption, not just unpopularity,

spk_0 not just a few complaints.

spk_0 It needs to be serious.

spk_0 But how do school leaders determine that the disruption was substantial?

spk_0 Well, in this case, they pointed to what happened right after the post.

spk_0 They pointed to things like huge numbers of angry phone calls,

spk_0 WQAD mentioned over 1200 calls in that Iowa district.

spk_0 Wow.

spk_0 Superintendent Fisher actually went on record saying,

spk_0 this has created a substantial material disruption to our learning environment

spk_0 the last 12 hours.

spk_0 And high student absence rates like 8% in Iowa reportedly linked to the controversy.

spk_0 They argued the post caused this disruption.

spk_0 And as these consequences started rolling out,

spk_0 the reactions from teachers themselves were all over the map.

spk_0 Many are grieving Kirk's death,

spk_0 summer scrubbing their social media accounts and laying low.

spk_0 Others are speaking out on Oscar Lusta Iowa High School art teacher

spk_0 who was fired over his comments about Charlie Kirk is now suing the district

spk_0 and it's superintendent.

spk_0 Matthew Cargo claims they violated his constitutional rights.

spk_0 No matter how you feel about Charlie Kirk,

spk_0 his murder has shaken the education community

spk_0 as this new school term begins.

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 And what strikes you immediately from the sources is this core tension.

spk_0 Educators suddenly facing judgment, serious judgment for things they posted online.

spk_0 On their own time.

spk_0 Right now in the classroom.

spk_0 Exactly.

spk_0 It throws up these really difficult questions, doesn't it?

spk_0 It's created a real sense of uncertainty, I think.

spk_0 You know, what can I actually say online?

spk_0 So we're seeing this pushback, this organized response,

spk_0 trying to counter actions that may be prioritized public anger over actual due process.

spk_0 Okay, let's start with Florida.

spk_0 The Florida Education Association, the FEA.

spk_0 There's been a really organized, powerful response.

spk_0 There are President Andrew Spar,

spk_0 you some really strong language.

spk_0 What we're seeing right now,

spk_0 feels to me to be McCarthy like where people are being encouraged by the commissioner

spk_0 and by others to essentially hunt for teachers or staff or professors who are saying something

spk_0 that someone has a problem with to dox teachers to threaten teachers and staff and professors.

spk_0 We have to look at this from a rational standpoint.

spk_0 Was what the teacher or staff or professor said?

spk_0 Does it really impact their ability to do their job?

spk_0 Or was this some mob mentality came into play and made this a bigger issue

spk_0 with the intent of saying this person should be terminated from their job?

spk_0 Okay, so let's get to the mean potatoes.

spk_0 What legal protections do educators actually have

spk_0 and does it make a difference if they're working at a public or private school?

spk_0 Well, that's an easy one.

spk_0 You have no rights, a private employer.

spk_0 You know, it's really in business of making money.

spk_0 And if they feel that your behavior offline on the weekend,

spk_0 on your own time, makes them look bad, they can choose to let you go.

spk_0 That was Larry Panky, an Atlanta employment discrimination lawyer.

spk_0 But what about educators at public schools?

spk_0 Here's what David Hudson, associate professor at Velmont University College of Law said.

spk_0 Publish school teachers do possess some level of first amendment free speech rights at school,

spk_0 but they are limited.

spk_0 To find out how limited we looked for someone who could clarify the differences for those of us

spk_0 without a law degree, we found Nico Perino.

spk_0 He's the executive vice president at the foundation for individual rights and expression,

spk_0 a fiercely non-partisan free speech advocacy organization.

spk_0 Private institutions can police speech within its ranks to the extent that they wish.

spk_0 That's part of their free association rights.

spk_0 But anytime you're talking about the government,

spk_0 the first amendment comes to bear.

spk_0 We have certain standards under the first amendment for public employees.

spk_0 If they're operating within their job, there's less free speech

spk_0 first amendment protection or close to none.

spk_0 But if they're speaking out as citizens outside of their role as a public employee,

spk_0 they have first amendment rights that need to be taken into account.

spk_0 It's definitely not straightforward.

spk_0 Eventually, we discover that free speech rights for public school educators are not black and white.

spk_0 Attorney Tom Mooney says it comes down to two questions.

spk_0 Is the comment on a matter of public concern?

spk_0 Because if it's a matter of personal grievance, it's not protected by the first amendment.

spk_0 The second question is, does the importance of the speech outweigh any disruptive impact of the

spk_0 speech? As you might imagine, that's not always clear.

spk_0 Which, of course, raises the question, how do we actually figure out what qualifies?

spk_0 The courts have identified the following considerations.

spk_0 Does the speech cause conflict in the workplace?

spk_0 Does the speech interfere with close working relationships?

spk_0 For example, somebody on a blog talking about his principle is different from someone on a

spk_0 blog talking about the superintendent.

spk_0 And the former may be viewed as disruptive if the principal and the teacher have to work directly

spk_0 together and teachers and superintendents don't.

spk_0 So we look at the impact on close working relationships, the time, manner, and place of the speech,

spk_0 and the degree of public interest in the speech.

spk_0 So the bottom line for you listening is that line between private opinion and

spk_0 professional fallout, it's getting blurrier and blurrier.

spk_0 Yeah, and it leaves us with a really tough question, doesn't it?

spk_0 As political talk gets more and more intense, how do we protect both free speech and keep schools safe

spk_0 and stable learning environments? A prior conversation we had with Eric Heinz,

spk_0 Zan Nassel, and Jonathan Zimmerman, two Ivy League lawyers in the historian,

spk_0 provided some much-needed context.

spk_0 As an educator and as a citizen, I think the most important thing is,

spk_0 many people on the right and the left have lost sight of the centrality of free speech and the

spk_0 necessity of it.

spk_0 But we know that a lot of people believe free speech basically means I can say anything I want,

spk_0 anytime I want, anywhere I want.

spk_0 We think we know about it and we realize that there's very much we don't know.

spk_0 The minute anyone says, I am a free speech absolutist, you can be sure they just don't understand

spk_0 the basic principles of free speech.

spk_0 Free speech is not absolute, never has been, and it does require all of us to exercise a measure

spk_0 of voluntary restraint.

spk_0 And we're trying to figure out what the proper and the improper limits on it are.

spk_0 Maybe Niko Pereno's final thoughts are a step in the right direction.

spk_0 As a broader cultural matter, I would prefer that we live in a society where our first instinct

spk_0 in response to speech we dislike isn't going out and grabbing the digital pitchforks

spk_0 and trying to figure out how to get our fellow citizens fired from their jobs or otherwise ruin

spk_0 their life. I think there's something deeply corrosive about that.

spk_0 Charly lived by the principle that no matter how horrible another person's speech may be their ideas,

spk_0 must be defeated by better ideas.

spk_0 And that's the last word.

spk_0 Keep the conversation going.

spk_0 This hybrid podcast used a combination of human and AI talent.

spk_0 If you hear an error or have a suggestion, leave a comment below.

Educators Feel Free Speech Fallout From Kirk Killing: What’s Appropriate, Who Decides?

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