Case 4:22-cv-00324-MW-MAF Document 44 Filed 11/17/22 Page 112 of 139
subjecting any student or employee to training or instruction that espouses, promotes, advances, inculcates, or compels such student or employee to believe any” of those concepts. Id. at 2–3. Likewise, the regulation requires universities to note in their own regulations that the prohibition concerning the eight topics “does not prohibit discussion of the concepts as part of a larger course of training or instruction, provided such training or instruction is given in an objective manner without endorsement of the concepts.” Id. at 3.
Plaintiffs first argue that the eight concepts themselves are riddled with undefined terms so vague that they cannot determine what speech is prohibited. Borrowing from this Court’s discussion in Honeyfund of identical concepts specified under Chapter 760, the Pernell Plaintiffs highlight some of the myriad ambiguities present in the challenged provisions. See, e.g., ECF No. 13 at 36–39, in Case No.: 4:22cv304-MW/MAF; ECF No. 13-5 ¶ 15 (Sandoval Declaration) (“But my instruction could [be] perceived as violating the Stop W.O.K.E. Act by promoting the concept that my students should not attempt to treat their audience without respect to their racial identities—a concept I’m not even sure how to interpret. Indeed, [this concept] has become the center of conversations and questions I engage in with colleagues, because nobody can figure out what it means.”); id. ¶ 24 (noting ambiguity about “objectivity”).
112
