University professors in Texas are suing the state over ‘unconstitutional’ TikTok ban
The plaintiffs say the prohibition compromises their research and teaching while “preventing or seriously impeding faculty from pursuing research that relates to TikTok,” including studying the very disinformation and data-collection practices the restriction claims to address.
. The plaintiffs say the ban makes it “almost impossible for faculty to use TikTok in their classrooms — whether to teach about TikTok or to use content from TikTok to teach about other subjects.”in the name of the Coalition for Independent Technology Research, an academic research advocacy group the Texas professors are members of. The lawsuit names Governor Greg Abbott and 14 other state and public education officials as defendants. “The government’s authority to control their research and teaching… cannot survive First Amendment scrutiny,” the complaint says. One example cited by the plaintiffs is Jacqueline Vickery, Associate Professor in the Department of Media Arts at the University of North Texas, who studies and teaches how young people use social media for expression and political organizing. “The ban has forced her to suspend research projects and change her research agenda, alter her teaching methodology, and eliminate course materials,” the complaint reads. “It has also undermined her ability to respond to student questions and to review the work of other researchers, including as part of the peer-review process.” The lawsuit says that, although faculty at public universities are public employees, the First Amendment shields them from government control over their research and teaching. “Imposing a broad restraint on the research and teaching of public university faculty is not a constitutionally permissible means of protecting Texans’ ‘way of life’ or countering the threat of disinformation,” the suit says, citing
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