Labor & Employment Law Daily Wrap Up, LITIGATION NEWS, TRENDS—Disciplinary actions against employees over Kirk statements continue, more lawsuits likely on the horizon, (Sep 29, 2025)
Organizations Mentioned:Austin Peay State University | Ball State University | California State University | Clemson University | Howard University | Missouri State University | Rutgers University | University of New Mexico | University of South Dakota | University of Tennessee | University of Wyoming | Valencia College
By Brandi O. Brown, J.D.
Tennessee and Florida appear to be particular hotbeds of activity.
Last week, a South Dakota court granted a TRO halting a university’s action against a professor who called Kirk a ‘hate spreading Nazi’ on social media—the university took action after that state’s house speaker, who is a 2026 gubernatorial candidate, reached out to the university professor and called for the professor to be fired.
Tennessee professors. In an ongoing and strikingly similar story, a university in Tennessee has similarly acted against a professor at the urging of U.S. Senator Marsha Blackburn, who is also a gubernatorial candidate for 2026, and who appeared to call for termination of the professor who had shared, without comment, a two-year-old article regarding Kirk’s own statements about gun deaths. She asked, “What do you say, Austin Peay State University?” with a link to the university’s Facebook page. The university fired the professor, but then shifted that to suspension after realizing that it had denied the employee due process. The university president’s actions led to a proposed resolution of no-confidence by the faculty senate, which was only narrowly defeated.
In this same window of time, another Tennessee professor—this one at Middle Tennessee State University—was fired by her employer after stating on Facebook that she had “zero sympathy” for the public figure because “hate begets hate.” And yet another professor, this one at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville, was placed on administrative leave for comments about Kirk made in response to someone else’s post.
As noted by a Nashville news source, these treatments contrast widely from that experienced by a University of Tennessee law professor who tweeted “run them down” regarding the people protesting in Charlotte after a police shooting. He was not disciplined.
Dozens of educators. According to a USA Today news article, over 100 people have faced employment consequences for remarks about the public figure’s death. Of course, we all know about Jimmy Kimmel. But a large portion of that number appears to include educators, including, for example, multiple professors at Florida Atlantic University, a dean at Middle Tennessee State, and faculty members at Clemson University. The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, for example, highlights situations it is monitoring at California State, Fresno; Augusta University; Valencia College; California State University, Stanislaus; Sandhills Community College; University of New Mexico; Susquehanna University; University of Wyoming; Rutgers University; Virginia Tech; Missouri State University; University of Texas at Austin; Montana State University-Northern; Howard University; and the University of South Dakota.
Florida. At Florida Atlantic University, an odd set of disciplinary actions has ensued. One professor was suspended for her posts about Kirk, followed by another a few days later, and then another a few days after that. The first professor, whose X account was private and in which she stated “opinions mine” in her bio, was the faculty adviser for the campus’s College Democrats and she reposted other users’ comments on her page, which had described Kirk’s statements as racist, sexist, and homophobic. She was placed on leave. A few days later, another professor was placed on leave for social media comments (not a post) about Kirk, in which she criticized Kirk’s debating efforts. Finally, a third professor, who was an apparent fan of Kirk and his brand of rhetoric, was placed on leave as well. This came after several of his personal social media posts were surfaced, including transphobic statements, and specifically a statement where he purportedly warned another commenter, “Be very afraid. We are going to hunt you down. And we will make you both unemployed and unemployable.”
AAUP issues statement. The American Association of University Professors issued a statement on September 15:
“The AAUP notes with great alarm the rash of recent administrative actions to discipline faculty, staff, and student speech in the aftermath of the murder of Charlie Kirk. We write to remind leaders of colleges and universities of their fundamental duty to protect academic freedom and the absolute necessity to ensure that the freedom to discuss topics of public import without constraint is not curtailed under political pressure. As established in the 1940 Statement of Principles on Academic Freedom and Tenure, faculty are entitled to hearings under long-standing principles before they may be subject to discipline. At a moment when higher education is threatened by forces that seek to destroy it and its role in a democratic society, the anticipatory obedience shown by this rush to judgment must be avoided.”
Other university employees too. In Indiana, moreover, the ACLU has filed a lawsuit on behalf of a Ball State University employee—who worked in the Division of Student Affairs as Director of Health Promotion and Advocacy— and who, according to the details included in her complaint, stated on her Facebook page, which was set to private and included no personal details, comments such as “Charlie Kirk’s death is a reflection of the violence, fear, and hatred he sowed. It does not excuse his death, AND it’s a sad truth.” She stated that his death was a “tragedy” and that she felt for his family, but added that the deaths of the Hortmans, as well as all of the children shot in Minneapolis and Colorado on the same day were also tragedies. She noted that Kirk had “excused the deaths of children in the name of the second amendment.” Her post was shared with the state attorney general, who shared it on his official Facebook page and online elsewhere. She was fired.
K-12 as well. In another lawsuit, brought by a teacher assistant at an elementary school in South Carolina, the assistant was fired as a result of a private, personal Facebook post, which she made outside of work hours and on her own device, in which she primarily quoted Kirk himself, adding only a few words of her own:
“I think it’s worth to have a cost of, unfortunately, some gun deaths every single year so that we can have the Second amendment to protect our other God-given Rights. That is a prudent deal. It is rational.”—Charlie Kirk. Thoughts and prayers.”
In comments below, she added: “[T]he WHOLE point here is that any time someone is killed fits [sic] a tragedy. Even someone I may not like. Even someone I disagree with. But instead of accepting it, why don’t we do something about it?” She also added, to clarify, “I disagree with [Kirk] and think today should not have happened. I’m sorry it did” and that she felt “no satisfaction” but “[j]ust hearbreak” for everyone affected by gun violence.
Iowa high school teacher. An Iowa high school art teacher was almost immediately put on leave, and ultimately fired, after posting on social media a comment about the death. He filed suit in a federal district court alleging the school district’s actions constituted retaliation in violation of the First Amendment. According to the teacher’s complaint, he posted on his own personal Facebook account, while off duty and not using school resources, the following statement referring to the death of the conservative activist: “1 Nazi down.” He alleges that the “post was a blunt personal reaction to a high-profile political event: speech on a matter of public concern at the very core of the First Amendment’s protections.” He described the comment “rhetorical hyperbole about a widely reported public event” that “did not threaten any person, did not incite imminent unlawful action, and was not directed at any member of the school community.”
Education Secretary’s response. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon recently stated to Fox News: “I've seen some of those college presidents who have fired or suspended teachers or other faculty members that have spoken out really incredibly poorly and celebrated Charlie's death—I would like to see more of that, quite frankly.”
If she does see more, it is likely the courts will see more lawsuits as well.
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