US District Judge Mark Walker has blocked a law in Florida that would have prevented transgender school teachers from self-introducing with their personal pronouns to students. This law, which came into effect in 2023, precludes teachers from using non-gender conforming titles or pronouns. The prohibition was challenged by two teachers who were prohibited from addressing themselves with their chosen pronouns.
Teachers Katie Wood and AV Schwandes objected to the law based on their rights under First Amendment as well as Title VII, Title IX, and the Fourteenth Amendment. Katie Wood, a transgender woman using she/her pronouns, was granted a preliminary injunction. However, the same request by AV Schwandes, a non-binary individual who refers to themselves as they/them, was denied due to their termination from the school for refusing to abide by the pronoun law.
The court granted a preliminary injunction specifically for Wood based on the belief that it wasn’t an outright challenge to the law but rather a case-specific challenge. However, Walker’s remarks indicate a lack of support for the Florida Law. He referred to a quote from American poet Walt Whitman, lauding Wood for her affirmation of her gender identity.
‘In sharing her preferred title and pronouns, Ms. Wood celebrates herself and sings herself, not in a disruptive or coercive way, but in a way that subtly vindicates her identity, her dignity, and her humanity. [The Florida law] has silenced her and, by silencing her, forced her to inhabit an identity that is not her own. The State of Florida has not justified this grave restraint, and so the United States Constitution does not tolerate it. Ours is a Union of individuals, celebrating ourselves and singing ourselves and being ourselves without apology.’
Judge Walker feels strongly that Wood will likely overcome this First Amendment dispute, justifying her preliminary injunction. Despite the law standing firm across Florida, Wood will be permitted to introduce herself with her preferred pronouns to her students while her case is decided later this year. This situation follows a settlement in a civil rights suit challenging similar “don’t say gay” laws in Florida and introductions of comparable laws in other states.