US DOE: All public colleges, universities must comply with First Amendment
The following quote may be attributed to Alliance Defending Freedom Senior Counsel Zack Pruitt regarding the U.S. Department of Education’s new regulations issued Wednesday which require all public colleges and universities that are federal grant recipients to comply with the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution:“Public colleges and universities should model the First Amendment values they’re supposed to be teaching students. We commend the U.S. Department of Education for understanding this and for desiring to see educational institutions that receive taxpayer dollars respect the constitutionally protected freedoms of everyone. As ADF knows well from the huge volume of legal matters it handles each year and our 442 legal victories to date, many public colleges and universities, when they disagree with a particular viewpoint, are willing to run roughshod over the First Amendment’s protections that all Americans have to freely speak, associate with like-minded people, and peaceably assemble. Those freedoms belong to the very taxpayers who provide the money for public grants; therefore, the taxpayers have good reason to expect grant recipients to respect their rights and their children’s rights that are protected by the First Amendment.”
The ADF Center for Academic Freedom is dedicated to ensuring freedom of speech and association for students and faculty so that everyone can freely participate in the marketplace of ideas without fear of government censorship.
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ABOUT Zack Pruitt
Zack Pruitt serves as senior counsel and director of U.S. government relations at Alliance Defending Freedom. In this role, he promotes ADF's policy and legislative work at the national level on behalf of the broader ADF public policy team. As a principal strategist, Pruitt oversees the federal and state government relations teams and provides legal counsel regarding ADF’s core issues to state officials, members and staff of the U.S. Congress, the White House, and federal agencies. Prior to joining ADF, Pruitt served as senior policy analyst at Americans for Prosperity and director of public policy for the Family Action Council of Tennessee. Pruitt earned his Juris Doctor with a certificate in International and Comparative Law from St. Louis University School of Law. He obtained his bachelor’s degree in history from the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga. He is member of the state bar in Tennessee and the District of Columbia and is also admitted to practice in the U.S. Supreme Court.