The U.S. Supreme Court won't consider whether a Justice Department memo calling for investigating threats against school officials violated parents' freedom of speech.
In 2021, Attorney General Merrick Garland issued a memo calling for investigating the “disturbing spike in harassment, intimidation, and threats of violence” levied at schools and school boards.
It came in response to a Sept. 29, 2021, letter in which the National School Boards Association had argued that “acts of malice, violence, and threats against public school officials” could be considered "a form of domestic terrorism and hate crimes” under the Patriot Act.
Parents in Loudoun County, Virginia, and Saline, Michigan, charged the memo was "designed to intimidate and silence parent protestors at school board meetings.”
However, Garland didn't use the “domestic terrorism” language or endorse the deployment of the Patriot Act, CNN reported in 2022. "Garland testified to Congress in October that complaints about education and school boards are 'totally protected by the First Amendment' as long as they are not threats of violence."
Comments