DES MOINES, Iowa (CN) — After a setback from an appellate court in August, advocates for the legal rights of LGBTQ+ students on Monday announced renewed efforts to block an Iowa law banning certain books labeled obscene from public school libraries.
Six Iowa students who identify as LGBTQ+, along with two public school teachers and a student association, filed an amended complaint in federal court in Des Moines challenging the constitutionality of Iowa’s law, Senate File 496, signed into law last year by Republican Iowa Governor Kim Reynolds.
Publisher Penguin Random House, representing its publisher and authors, filed a second amended complaint in the First Amendment case.
The ACLU and Lambda Legal argue the law has caused “chaos and confusion and deprived the plaintiff students of access to books based on content and viewpoint.”
At least 3,400 books have been removed from Iowa schools, according to an analysis by the Des Moines Register in June. The plaintiffs seek to enjoin enforcement of the law.
The amended complaints respond to a ruling in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit that lifted a previous injunction, which allowed Iowa to begin enforcing the law and sent the case back to the trial court to reconsider the plaintiffs’ challenges. The three-judge panel said the plaintiffs’ argument that the law is unconstitutional on its face would be hard to win, citing the U.S. Supreme Court’s July decision in Moody v. NetChoice, a First Amendment case involving online content moderation.
In their amended complaint, the ACLU and Lambda Legal address that Supreme Court decision, which was handed down after the original suits were filed.
The plaintiffs argue that under Moody, Iowa’s statute could be held unconstitutional on overbreadth grounds. They also say the law is unconstitutional as it is being applied by five defendant school districts, whose policies fail to resolve the inherent vagueness of the statute — and thus fail to protect students' First Amendment rights.
“Although the governor signed SF 496 into law in May, Iowa schools had virtually no guidance on how to comply with the law,” the plaintiffs say. “Administrators, teachers, parents, and students are confused about how to comply with SF 496. Teachers and administrators across the state have expressed panic and anxiety about how to implement the law."
Across the state, schools have diverged widely in the list of books and other materials banned from classrooms and libraries, the plaintiffs say.
ACLU of Iowa attorney Thomas Story said the new filings mark the beginning of the next lawsuit's next stage.
"SF 496 continues to threaten the safety and rights of LGBTQ+ students and erode the trust between them and their teachers," Story said.
Until it is blocked again, he said, the law will suppress the plaintiffs' and their advocates' efforts “to secure an inclusive environment for all of Iowa’s public school students."
More: https://www.courthousenews.com/lgbtq-advocates-mount-revamped-challenge-to-iowa-book-ban/
