Supreme Court declines fired teacher's free speech challenge over anti-transgender TikToks
The Supreme Court on Monday declined to hear a Massachusetts teacher's First Amendment challenge concerning her termination for making and reposting anti-transgender TikToks. Former Hanover Public Schools teacher Kari MacRae stressed the TikToks were made before she applied to the job and urged the court to take up her case to protect public employees' free speech rights.
One post condemned Rachel Levine, the highest-ranking transgender official in the Biden administration. Another boasted a panda bear photo alongside text that read, 'Dude, racism is stupid. I am black, white, and Asian. But everyone loves me.'
'I feel bad for parents nowadays,' another post read. 'You have to be able to explain the birds & the bees . . . The bees & the bees . . . The birds & the birds . . . The birds that used to be bees . . . The bees that used to be birds . . . The birds that look like bees . . . Plus bees that look like birds but still got a stinger!!!'
No justice publicly dissented from the decision to turn away her appeal. But in a seven-page statement, Justice Clarence Thomas said he had 'serious concerns' about the lower court's approach that sided against the teacher.
'It undermines core First Amendment values to allow a government employer to adopt an institutional viewpoint on the issues of the day and then, when faced with a dissenting employee, portray this disagreement as evidence of disruption,' Thomas wrote.
'And, the problem is exacerbated in the case of an employee such as MacRae, who expressed her views only outside the workplace and before her employment.'
However, Thomas indicated he agreed with the court's decision to turn away MacRae's petition, saying it didn't squarely challenge those broader issues. The justice signaled he would take up a future case to make clear public employers can not use 'unsupported claims of disruption in particular to target employees who express disfavored political views.'
After her firing, MacRae unsuccessfully ran for Massachusetts state Senate in both 2022 and 2024. She's running again for election next year.
MacRae was represented by Judicial Watch, a conservative watchdog group.
'This case could not be a more perfect vehicle for the Court to determine the rights of the tens-of-millions aspiring teachers who are participating in public affairs and the four million public-school teachers who spoke on matters of public concern before they were employed,' the group wrote in its petition.
The school district insisted the lower ruling rejecting MacRae's appeal was in harmony with Supreme Court precedents on public school teachers' free speech rights. 'There is no question that the TikTok memes violated the District's core values and mission statement, as found by both the District Court and First Circuit,' the school district wrote in court filings. The order comes weeks after the Supreme Court declined to hear a student's challenge to his school district blocking him from wearing a T-shirt to class that reads, 'There are only two genders.'
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