An Arab American advocacy group challenging AB 715 in federal court has dropped its legal appeal and is on “much weaker footing” in its efforts to undo the new state law, the Jewish Public Affairs Committee of California announced Thursday.
The law, which addresses antisemitism in California’s K-12 schools, faced a legal challenge from the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC) just weeks after Gov. Gavin Newsom signed it on Oct. 7. The D.C.-based group says AB 715 denies teachers their rights to free speech.
The law went into effect on Jan. 1, a day after a U.S. District Court judge denied ADC’s motion for a preliminary injunction to stop it. ADC filed its appeal with the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals on Jan. 2.
The Arab American group filed the case in early November, calling the new law “unconstitutionally vague,” “hastily written” and a threat to teachers’ First Amendment rights.
In her Dec. 31 ruling, U.S. District Judge Noël Wise wrote, “Plaintiffs struggled to articulate any provision of AB 715 that was unconstitutional.… The court does not find the word antisemitism in AB 715 to be vague.” Wise also noted that teachers “do not have First Amendment rights while teaching.”
The ADC disagreed, arguing that the U.S. Supreme Court has “never held that educators surrender their constitutional protections when they teach.”
“Teachers are not meant to be government mouthpieces,” a Jan. 2 press release read. “ADC has never argued that classrooms should be used to push personal political ideologies –– teachers do have First Amendment rights, including the right to teach accurate history and foster open discussion and debate.”
Seth Brysk, American Jewish Committee’s regional director for Northern California, took issue with the ADC’s characterization.
“This question is not about whether or not a teacher allows for a discussion to take place in their classes,” he told J. “The types of incidents that we have encountered when it comes to antisemitism in the classroom … were conveying a point of view that wasn’t in the curricula, doesn’t conform with state standards, and that is biased in some cases against Israel and, in some cases, against Jews.”
AB 715 passed overwhelmingly in both houses of the Legislature in September. It adds regulations to the state education code and adds rules for public school officials, administrators and teachers. It will also establish a new Office for Civil Rights to serve as a clearinghouse for discrimination complaints across the state.
Throughout December, several Jewish advocacy organizations worked with prominent law firms to file amicus briefs that would allow them to weigh in on the broader stakes of AB 715’s implementation. Among them were the American Jewish Committee, the Jewish Public Affairs Committee of California and grassroots groups such as the Bay Area Jewish Coalition.
On Jan. 30, Tony Thurmond, the state’s superintendent of public instruction, filed a motion to dismiss the case.
“The court has held that it lacks subject matter jurisdiction over this case and that Plaintiffs fail to establish viable claims,” Thurmond wrote. “Yet, Plaintiffs did not dismiss this case. Defendant now respectfully requests that the Court take that next step and dismiss it.”
While the position of the case seems weaker, with the denied motion for preliminary injunction and dropped appeal, Brysk emphasized that the fight is not over yet.
“We are gratified to see that AB 715 is going to continue,” Brysk said. “But we also know that it’s going to require continued defense, and we are prepared to defend the law, which will protect against discrimination in the classroom.”
In a livestreamed video posted to X shortly after the Dec. 31 ruling, Jenin Younes, ADC’s national legal director, vowed to keep fighting the law through the courts, potentially even as far as the Supreme Court.
