VICTORY: Federal appeals court decisively rejects Florida’s ‘Stop WOKE Act’

• Court rules that Florida professors are not mouthpieces for the government and that the ‘Stop WOKE Act’ violates the First Amendment.
• Ruling rejects Florida’s attempt to enact a “speech ban on all public college and university professors,” protects academic freedom and free inquiry on campus.
• Court: “The ideas Florida targets may well be noxious. Or maybe not. Either way, in this context the First Amendment trusts students to figure it out for themselves.”  

ATLANTA, July 7, 2026 — Following a First Amendment lawsuit filed by the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, a federal appeals court ruled today that Florida’s “Stop WOKE Act” — a broad ban on what faculty at public universities may discuss in the classroom — violates the First Amendment rights of Florida university faculty and students. The ruling affirms a previous court decision that blocked the legislation from taking effect.

“Though the government has plenty of ways to promote its own viewpoint, puppeteering every university professor in the state is not one of them,” wrote Judge Britt C. Grant of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit in the decision. “Forcing an official government line—in a college classroom of all places—is exactly the ‘pall of orthodoxy’ that the First Amendment will not tolerate.”

In September 2022, the FIRE filed a lawsuit challenging Florida’s “Individual Freedom” law (dubbed the “Stop WOKE Act” by its proponents). FIRE’s lawsuit — on behalf of a professor, student, and a student group — argued that the higher education provisions of the act unconstitutionally chill free expression and mandate faculty censorship on the state’s college campuses. In today’s ruling, a majority of the Eleventh Circuit panel agreed. 

“Today’s important decision means that college remains a place where professors and students are allowed to debate controversial topics — even if politicians disagree with them,” said FIRE senior attorney Greg H. Greubel. “Today’s ruling makes clear something we’ve known for a long time: Governments cannot censor their way to freedom.” 

The ruling by the Eleventh Circuit (which covers Florida, Alabama, and Georgia) is a crucial victory for academic freedom and free inquiry on our public campuses. The court joins the Second, Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, Seventh, and Ninth Circuits in holding that the First Amendment protects public university faculty’s academic freedom when they engage in teaching and scholarship. No appellate court has come to a different conclusion.

“As a professor, I shouldn’t have to choose between teaching to the best of my ability or facing punishment,” said Professor Adriana Novoa, who teaches Latin American history at the University of South Florida. “This decision is such a relief to professors who care about their students and want them to become well-rounded and informed. It will allow me and countless other professors to teach our classes without government interference.”

COURTESY PHOTOS FOR MEDIA

The appeals court held that Florida’s “Stop WOKE Act” violates the First Amendment because it “bars Florida’s educators from promoting or endorsing” disfavored ideas about “race, color, sex, and national origin” while allowing criticism of those same ideas. As the court explained, the law targets eight concepts, including whether a person is inherently biased based on race or sex, whether privilege or oppression is determined by race or sex, and whether virtues such as “merit, excellence, hard work, fairness, neutrality, objectivity, and racial colorblindness” are racist.

The court emphasized that “the First Amendment trusts students to figure it out for themselves” and rejected Florida’s claim that it may control professors’ speech because it pays their salaries. “Florida’s restrictions are, as the State admits, an attempt to force uniformity of thought on students by curtailing the free exchange of ideas in universities—the very environments traditionally regarded as laboratories for expression and truth seeking,” wrote Judge Grant.

The Eleventh Circuit’s ruling means that the district court’s November 2022 injunction halting enforcement of key parts of the act in Florida’s public universities remains in place. In its injunction, the district court called the act “positively dystopian.” 

FIRE represents Professor Novoa, former student Sam Rechek, and the First Amendment Forum student organization in the suit, with Florida attorney and FIRE Legal Network member Gary Edinger serving as local counsel.

FIRE’s challenge to the Stop WOKE Act was heard alongside a related challenge filed by the ACLU, ACLU of Florida, and NAACP Legal Defense Fund. 

Amicus support from across the ideological spectrum included briefs from the Academic Freedom Alliance, American Association of University Professors, Cato Institute, First Amendment Lawyers Association, Profs. Amna Khalid and Jeffrey Aaron Snyder, LatinoJustice, Learning for Justice and the Florida Freedom to Read Project, The New Press, policing scholars and organizations led by Law Enforcement Action Partnership, the National Education Association, United Faculty of Florida, National Black Law Students Association, Stand for Freedom, and PEN America.

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The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE) is a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization dedicated to defending and sustaining the individual rights of all Americans to free speech and free thought — the most essential qualities of liberty. FIRE recognizes that colleges and universities play a vital role in preserving free thought within a free society. To this end, we place a special emphasis on defending the individual rights of students and faculty members on our nation’s campuses, including freedom of speech, freedom of association, due process, legal equality, religious liberty, and sanctity of conscience.

CONTACT
Katie Stalcup, Communications Campaign Manager, FIRE: 215-717-3473; media@thefire.org