Pro-Palestinian groups targeted by DeSantis urge Florida court to block punishments

The University of Florida chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine sued Gov. Ron DeSantis and other state officials in federal court, seeking to block an order that would deactivate the group, according to reporting from WUSF dated November 17, 2023.

The order at issue was issued October 24, 2023, by State University System Chancellor Ray Rodrigues, who cited the national Students for Justice in Palestine organization's "toolkit" and a statement described as solidarity with resistance against Israel as grounds for deactivating campus chapters, per WUSF's coverage.

The lawsuit named Rodrigues, DeSantis, University of Florida President Ben Sasse, and members of the Florida Board of Governors and UF Board of Trustees as defendants, with support from the ACLU of Florida and Palestine Legal, according to WUSF.

The First Amendment argument

The right of students to associate and speak through college organizations is a fundamental precursor to their political and ideological expression.

That argument, from the group's legal filing as reported by WUSF, framed the deactivation order as viewpoint-based discrimination against the local chapter based on the speech of its national parent organization, rather than any conduct by the UF chapter itself.

The state's response

Groups that claim to be part of a foreign terrorist movement have no place on our university campuses.

That statement was attributed to a spokesperson for the governor, per WUSF's reporting. The retrieved coverage does not include a direct response from Rodrigues or the University of Florida system to the specific First Amendment claims in the lawsuit.

The court's ruling

Chief U.S. District Judge Mark Walker denied the preliminary injunction request on January 31, 2024, according to reporting from WGCU. Walker found that any threat of deactivation was "speculative" rather than imminent, noting that although Chancellor Rodrigues's October 24, 2023 memorandum had directed the University of Florida and University of South Florida to deactivate their SJP chapters, both universities had consulted outside counsel -- who warned that following through would expose the schools to legal liability -- and neither university had actually taken steps to deactivate the groups. Walker acknowledged the students' anxiety over the threat but ruled it was not sufficient legal grounds for an injunction, per WGCU's account.

As a result, the student chapters remained operational after the ruling, though the court left open the possibility of future action if a university did move to deactivate a chapter. The ACLU said it would pursue additional legal challenges on First Amendment grounds if state officials attempted to enforce the order going forward, according to WGCU's reporting.

What it signals

The lawsuit set up a direct test of how far a state university system can go in acting against a student group over the statements of its national affiliate, rather than the local chapter's own conduct — a distinction the ACLU and Palestine Legal argued was constitutionally significant. The eventual ruling turned on timing rather than that underlying constitutional question: Walker's decision rested on the universities never having enforced the directive, leaving the First Amendment question itself unresolved rather than decided in either side's favor.

US In News compiled this archived account from contemporaneous coverage by WUSF and WGCU. It restores a story originally published on this site in November 2023; figures are as reported at the time.