Judge Tosses Texas AFT Suit Aimed at Stopping Probes of Teachers Who Cheered Charlie Kirk’s Killing

U.S. District Judge Alan D. Albright dismissed the Texas American Federation of Teachers’ First Amendment lawsuit against Texas Education Agency Commissioner Mike Morath, holding that the union lacked standing because Morath’s September 2025 letter to superintendents created no new mandate. The Aug. 21 order, issued in the Western District of Texas in Austin, dismissed the case without prejudice. Albright wrote that “the Morath Letter simply states that Commissioner Morath would be referring any content that he believed to violate the current Educators’ Code of Ethics to the current Educator Investigations Division.” “The Court does not see any ‘mandate’ in the letter, because the Morath Letter does not announce any new requirement or threat from Commissioner Morath.”

He said any employment consequences flowed from existing ethics rules and local districts, not from the letter itself. Repealing the letter, he wrote, would not change members’ situation. The ruling did not decide whether individual posts were protected speech or whether later TEA or district discipline was constitutional.

Charlie Kirk was shot and killed on Sept. 10, 2025. Two days later Morath told every superintendent that TEA had seen educators posting “reprehensible and inappropriate” and “vile” content about the assassination and that he would send documentation to the Educator Investigations Division. He wrote that free speech “does not give carte blanche authority to celebrate or sow violence against those that share differing beliefs and perspectives.” Gov. Greg Abbott and TEA opened a complaint process. The agency said it received more than 300 complaints; many were later dismissed as unsubstantiated. Some districts fired teachers, placed others on leave, flagged certificates, or added names to “do not hire” lists.

Texas AFT sued on Jan. 6, 2026, arguing the letter was a new statewide speech code that chilled off-duty political speech. National AFT President Randi Weingarten called it “the classic definition of a First Amendment violation.” TEA and the attorney general answered that Morath had only restated the existing Code of Ethics and that districts, not the commissioner, control hiring and firing. Albright denied a preliminary injunction from the bench in April and later vacated that oral ruling when he granted the motion to dismiss. The union can refile. A separate Northern District case involving a Texas Tech law student remains on a different track.