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U.S. Supreme Court justices heard arguments on Wednesday on whether public schools can punish students for what they say off campus in a case involving a former Pennsylvania cheerleader’s foul-mouthed social media post that could impact the free speech rights of millions of young Americans.
The nine justices are considering an appeal by the Mahanoy Area School District of a lower court ruling in favor of Brandi Levy that found that the U.S. Constitution’s First Amendment guarantee of freedom of speech bars public school officials from regulating off-campus speech. The arguments were ongoing.
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(Reuters) - U.S. Supreme Court justices on Wednesday will consider whether public schools can punish students for what they say off campus in a case involving a former Pennsylvania cheerleader’s foul-mouthed social media post that could impact the free speech rights of millions of young Americans.
FILE PHOTO: Brandi Levy, a former cheerleader at Mahanoy Area High School in Mahanoy City, Pennsylvania and a key figure in a major U.S. case about free speech, poses in an undated photograph provided by the American Civil Liberties Union. Danna Singer/Handout via REUTERS
The nine justices are set hear arguments in an appeal by the Mahanoy Area School District of a lower court ruling in favor of Brandi Levy that found that the U.S. Constitution’s First Amendment guarantee of freedom of speech bars public school officials from regulating off-campus speech.
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The case, Mahanoy Area School District v. B.L., court file 20-255, was heard April 28.
The Biden administration was represented in a 112-minute telephonic hearing by Deputy Solicitor General Malcolm L. Stewart.
The petitioner, the school district in Mahanoy City, Pennsylvania, was represented by Lisa S. Blatt. The student involved in the case, known in court documents as B.L., was represented by David D. Cole, the national legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union. B.L., or Brandi Levy, was a minor at the time the lawsuit was initiated and legal files reduced her name to initials to protect her identity.
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The Supreme court on Wednesday considered the free speech implications its ruling could have in a high school cheerleader s First Amendment case.
At issue is a clash between Brandi Levy, a foul-mouthed cheerleader, and her Pennsylvania school district. The case arose in 2017 when Levy did not make her varsity cheer squad and responded with a Snapchat story, posted on a Saturday and off campus, in which she said, F - school. F - softball. F - cheer. F - everything. When faculty members saw the post, the school banned her from the sport for a year.
Levy and her parents teamed up with the American Civil Liberties Union to take the case to the court, arguing that the school had broadly overreached into her personal life. The school responded that, under a 1969 Supreme Court decision allowing schools leeway in regulating student speech, it could punish her because Levy s post had substantially disrupted school order. Several lower court judges sided with Levy, f
By Syndicated Content
By Andrew Chung
(Reuters) â U.S. Supreme Court justices on Wednesday will consider whether public schools can punish students for what they say off campus in a case involving a former Pennsylvania cheerleaderâs foul-mouthed social media post that could impact the free speech rights of millions of young Americans.
The nine justices are set hear arguments in an appeal by the Mahanoy Area School District of a lower court ruling in favor of Brandi Levy that found that the U.S. Constitutionâs First Amendment guarantee of freedom of speech bars public school officials from regulating off-campus speech.