Two Cobb County public schoolteachers are no longer with the school system and others have been placed on administrative leave following social media posts that “celebrated and condoned” the murder of young conservative activist Charlie Kirk, the district’s superintendent said Thursday evening.
Cobb Superintendent Chris Ragsdale confirmed the news during a school board meeting.
“Following (Kirk’s) murder, a number of individuals, including a handful of Cobb educators, intentionally and publicly celebrated and condoned his murder on social media,” Ragsdale said.
Ragsdale said parents, community members and teachers complained about the posts.
“They wondered if they and their children are safe in Cobb classrooms,” he said. “The answer is an emphatic ‘yes.’ This is not how the vast majority of Cobb team members act.”
Cobb officials announced Monday that some teachers had been put on administrative leave for posts about Kirk. Ragsdale did not say Thursday how many teachers were placed on leave and he did not describe the posts. District leaders have said they will report the comments to the state’s licensing board for teachers and will take “appropriate personnel action.” Cobb is Georgia’s second-largest school district.
Kirk, 31, was gunned down during an event at Utah Valley University on Sept. 10. He founded the conservative group Turning Point USA, which held events on college and high school campuses across the country to attract young members.
Although many across the political spectrum expressed condolences and sympathies after Kirk’s death, some took the opportunity to criticize Kirk and his positions. Several public schoolteachers and college professors across the U.S. have faced penalties for voicing their opinions. Emory University announced Thursday it terminated a “non-clinical faculty member” in the school of medicine over a social media post that “caused concern within our community.” A Columbus State University professor this week resigned two of his positions but retains his teaching responsibilities following statements he made on a Ledger-Enquirer Facebook post about Kirk, the Columbus news outlet reported.
The sanctions against educators have stirred up a wider debate about what kind of speech is protected under the U.S. Constitution’s First Amendment. Private companies and schools can fire employees for speech. But when it comes to public sector employees, like teachers and professors, some experts say the issue is murkier.
“’Aren’t they public employees? Don’t they have First Amendment rights?’ That is definitely not the end of the matter,” said Deepa Das Acevedo, an associate professor of law at Emory University.
Teachers sign contracts and agree to codes of conduct. Cobb, for example, has an extensive employee social media policy. Das Acevedo said the First Amendment limits the state’s ability to restrict speech, but doesn’t eliminate it.
“You can still be liable for harassing speech, hate speech and so on,” she said.
National teachers’ unions have argued that public schoolteachers shouldn’t be fired for what they say outside of class.
“Of course, no one should celebrate another person’s murder,” American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten said in a statement Thursday. “But using this tragedy to encourage the doxxing, censorship and firing of people for their opinions — including educators’ private opinions shared during their personal time — is wrong.”
Das Acevedo said public employees have some free speech rights, but they are more restrictive than many believe.
“(D)epending on how the speech in question and its effects are framed, there is a lot of room for public employees to be disciplined or terminated, even though their speech hasn’t broken any particular law and was made in a personal capacity and didn’t explicitly advocate violence,” she said.
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