A community college professor in California has filed a lawsuit against the college’s administrators, outlining how they punitively investigate faculty who disagree with progressive ideology in order to silence them.
This month, the Institute for Free Speech filed a lawsuit on behalf of Professor Daymon Johnson, a history professor at Bakersfield College, after Johnson was subjected to a five-month administrative investigation for calling a peer a radical social justice warrior. An extended investigation can violate the First Amendment when it is prolonged and persists even after it is clear the investigation is over constitutionally protected speech, as the California-based Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in White v. Lee (2000), when it ruled that fair-housing officials had violated the First Amendment and could be sued for damages for investigating citizens for 8 months long months over criticism of housing projects that the officials viewed as interference with housing rights.
Professor Johnson, who is still employed by the school, alleges his First Amendment rights are being violated. (Bakersfield College is public institution, and thus is covered by the First Amendment, see Keyishian v. Board of Regents (1967)).
His lawsuit asks the court to ban college officials from further investigating, punishing or firing him. His court complaint says, “Professor Johnson refrains from expressing himself on political matters for fear of being subjected to further investigations and termination. The First Amendment, however, guarantees Professor Johnson’s right to express himself, and it forbids the state from mandating that he subscribe to or promote any official ideology.”
The facts giving rise to the lawsuit began in September 2021. Then, Professor Andrew Bond filed an administrative complaint against Johnson for his criticism of a 2019 Facebook post by Bond that called America a “piece of s**t nation.”
“Maybe Trump’s comment about shithole countries was a statement of projection because honestly, the US is a fucking piece of shit nation. Go ahead and quote me, conservatives. This country has yet to live up to the ideals of its founding documents,” Bond wrote.
In May 2021, Johnson reposted Bond’s comments on the Facebook page for the Renegade Institute for Liberty (RIL). RIL describes itself as “a coalition of Bakersfield College faculty dedicated to the free speech, open inquiry, critical thinking to advance American ideals within the broader Western tradition of meritocracy, individual agency, civic virtue, liberty of conscience and free markets.”
Johnson posted Bond’s comment with a blurb calling Bond a critical race theorist and adding: “Do you agree with this radical SJW from BC’s English Department? Thoughts?”
Johnson then used his personal Facebook account to comment on what he had reposted: ‘Maybe he should move to China, and post this about the PRC in general or the Chinese Communist Party and see how much mileage it gets him. I wonder, do they still send the family the bill for the spent round?’”
In response, “Professor Bond filed an administrative complaint against Professor Johnson for harassment and bullying over the Facebook post and commentary.”
A five-month investigation into the matter by the Kern Community College District cleared Johnson of harassment and bullying, but left the door open to “investigate any further complaints of harassment and bullying and, if applicable, [taking] appropriate remedial action including but not limited to any discipline determined to be appropriate.”
Johnson’s lawsuit argues that Bakersfield College administrators “have sent an unmistakable message: anyone who dares commit wrongthink against the state-approved ideology—or who challenges other faculty who promote that ideology—can have their careers sidetracked or ruined.”
Johnson’s lawyer, Alan Gura, says, “BC’s intolerance of dissent, and its imposition of an official ideology on everyone, is unfortunately part of a growing trend. But if college students and faculty are willing to take a stand, the courts will end it. They should drop their complete hostility to diversity and inclusion — diversity of thought, inclusion of people who won’t bow to their particular ideology,” he said.
Johnson is not the only professor at Bakersfield whose free speech rights have been violated. In April, the Kern Community College District Board of Trustees, which oversees Bakersfield College, fired history professor Matthew Garrett after he spoke out against the school’s funding of social justice programs. Garrett and Professor Erin Miller filed a lawsuit in 2021 against their employer for violations of their free speech rights.
A Kern Community College trustee said scholars who object to critical race theory deserved to be taken to the “slaughterhouse,” but took back that comment after it created a public outcry.
The Institute for Free Speech says professors at Bakersfield College in California have been forced to endorse a “state-mandated ideology” or face reprisals: “BC administrators investigate and punish faculty who criticize or question their preferred views, including state-mandated, administration-approved ‘anti-racism’ ideology,” it said in a press release.
Garrett’s lawsuit is moving at a crawl through the court system, with no relief yet. He is also administratively appealing his termination.
Garrett says Johnson’s lawsuit “exposes a disturbing pattern by KCCD administrators to employ needless and dishonest HR investigations to silence even the mildest request for transparent discussion. He speaks now not only for himself but also for the countless other faculty that live in fear that they may be targeted for expressing intellectual curiosity.”
