What to know about Iowa’s ban on school books, LGBTQ+ topics halted by a judge

Lisa Desjardins:

In Iowa, a federal judge has temporarily blocked key parts of the law due to go into effect Monday that would ban books from school libraries if they depicted a quote sex act. The law signed by Republican Governor Kim Reynolds also bars teachers from discussing gender identity and sexuality before seventh grade.

Judge Stephen Walker agreed with those suing, writing that the law was incredibly broad, banning crucial history books, classic fiction, and even guides to help students avoid sexual assault.

To understand more, I'm joined by Derek Black, a professor of law at the University of South Carolina, and Erin Murphy, De Moines Bureau Chief at the Gazette. Derek, I want to start with you. This is a temporary decision by the judge. But how much does this tell us about the court fight ahead?

Derek Black, University of South Carolina School of Law: Yeah, to win a lawsuit like this, you have to establish that there's going to be a likelihood of irreparable harm, and that you're likely to win if you go to trial. And so this is quite common in these types of lawsuits.

So the judge said, Look, you're likely to win if you go to trial, and we can't allow this law to go into effect, because we can't unwind the problem once it starts. So, you know, there's not going to be much second guessing at the trial court level.

Now, of course, you can appeal a temporary injunction to the higher court. But right now, plaintiffs are in good shape and the trial court.

Lisa Desjardins:

A lot of issues here, Erin, including, of course, first amendment speech, but what do you know, from covering this about how widespread the effects might have been worse, they're expected to be many books pulled from the shelves in Iowa, widespread chilling of teachers speech.

Erin Murphy, Des Moines Bureau Chief, The Gazette:

There actually already has been, and that's part of the case that was made by the plaintiffs in the hearing that was previously held, they had a list of districts across the state and had a combined roughly 500 bucks that have already been pulled from those schools library shelf.

It'll be interesting to make moving forward. The state counter argued to that that some districts may be over applying the law and misinterpreting the law. And I think that will be an interesting argument as this legal process continues to play out whether if the law is being interpreted properly by the schools.

Lisa Desjardins:

Derek, there has been in the past court cases, rulings on sex ed, but this is hitting also a gender identity and transgender, gay, lesbian, bisexual can discussions in the classroom, can you help us understand what a court said so far about what schools can regulate and what is free speech?

Derek Black:

Well, the root problem here is that when this law said no discussion of sexual identity or no discussion of sexual orientation, the court says look on the face of it, what it's saying is you can't discuss maleness, you can't discuss femaleness, you can't discuss heterosexual couples.

So this, you know, it may have been the intent of the legislature to target LGBTQ issue courts, and based on the language you are borrowing, basically, every single book known to man, woman and whatever other pronoun you might want to apply that there's always a character with some sexual identity, or it's in some form of relationship. And this law, regardless of its intent, banned it all by its language, and so the court struck it down on that basis.

Lisa Desjardins:

Erin, what about that? I mean, we're schools confused, where their schools saying we can't talk about husbands and wives, those kinds of things.

Erin Murphy:

Yeah, that was an argument made all the way back to the legislative debate when the bill was being considered. And that gets to what the judge was talking about when he used terms like wildly overbroad and the state argued that, no, it's very clear, it's seeking to regulate very specific things.

But the plaintiffs have been arguing and opponents of the law have been saying, ever since its legislative debate, and throughout its implementation here, that it is confusing, and then it's — and it leaves so much gray area and educators say it paralyzes them and decisions they have to make and not knowing how they should make those decisions about what they can and can't discuss in the classroom, what books they can and can't keep in their libraries.

Lisa Desjardins:

Erin, how hot do you think this will be in the politics of 2024? And then, Derek to you, what do you think is culturally at stake? Erin first.

Erin Murphy:

Yeah, well, I'll say here in Idaho we're already seeing evidence of it as the first in the nation caucus state. We have Republican presidential candidates come in here. And often they're talking about this.

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis is one of the leading candidates. He passed a similar bill in Florida. And so he talks about this issue and former Vice President Mike Pence when he was in, he talked about this issue.

So, I — it certainly has been in play here politically in 2023 already in Iowa. So it wouldn't be surprising to me anyways, based on that, to see it as part of the election discussion in 2024.

Lisa Desjardins:

Derek Black.

Derek Black:

There's no playbook going for about two years now to get people upset and excited about their local school. So they'll come out and vote and midterm and what would be the next presidential election.

You know, the irony is that what's being taught or not taught at public schools really has nothing to do with federal policy at all, has nothing to do with who the president is or isn't but yet, this is, you know, this is a tool to get people excited and use overbroad terms that are undefined.

And I think the real fallout here that bothers me the most is that of our public schools themselves and the music of one place where we hope to bring people together, find common ground that, you know, our schools are not supposed to be political and what we ultimately have people injecting politics into the sort of last bastion of sanity, what I call a pillar of American democracy. So I think that's the real loser here is public education.

Lisa Desjardins:

Derek Black and Erin Murphy, thank you so much.