Florida Teachers Sue State Over Pronoun Law

Three teachers are suing the Florida Department of Education in federal court over Florida's new pronoun law that prohibits school employees from providing students "... his or her preferred personal title or pronouns if such preferred personal title or pronouns do not correspond to his or her sex..."

"We're not doing the pronoun Olympics in Florida," Governor Ron DeSantis said at a press conference when he signed the bill into law in May 2023.

"Educators in Florida are expected to teach our standards, and not interject their own opinions or worldview into the classroom," added Florida Department of Education Commisioner Manny Diaz, Jr.

The lawsuit alleges that the new Florida law unlawfully discriminates on the basis of sex and restrains the teachers’ speech, in violation of the U.S. Constitution and civil rights statutes. 

Under the statute, teachers violating the ban may be fired and lose their teaching certification.

“There is no American right more fundamental than freedom of expression and protection from the government that weaponizes their disagreements on that expression. Subsection 3 violates both of these,” said Katie Wood, one of the teachers named in the lawsuit.