Idaho educators challenge state law that censors speech about abortion News
© WikiMedia (Frank Schulenburg)
Idaho educators challenge state law that censors speech about abortion

Two teachers’ unions joined six professors in Idaho to bring a lawsuit Tuesday challenging the constitutionality of the No Public Funds for Abortion Act (NPFAA), an Idaho law that prohibits the use of public funds to provide, promote, or counsel in favor of abortion. According to a press release from the plaintiffs’ counsel the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), the law effectively “censors teaching, discussion, and scholarship about abortion at Idaho’s public universities.”

Filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Idaho, the lawsuit states that the NPFAA violates the First Amendment by censoring academic speech and the Fourteenth Amendment by using overly vague and broad language. The plaintiffs argue that the NPFAA has stifled free academic exchange about abortion across Idaho’s public universities by causing professors to change their course content. As evidence, the suit references a memo from the University of Idaho’s administration warning professors of the “potential risks and penalties associated with conduct that may be perceived to violate the laws.”

Ultimately, the lawsuit alleges that the NPFAA has “chilled academic speech at Idaho’s public universities.” The complaint reads:

Abortion is a topic that implicates legal, social, political, and moral principles and values. Abortion is therefore a critical topic of study, discussion, and scholarship across numerous academic fields…[t]he NPFAA, however, skews and suppresses academic inquiry and discussion about abortion at Idaho’s public universities…[d]ue to this speech restriction, as well as the lack of clarity about the NPFAA’s scope, many faculty members have been forced to refrain from engaging in a wide range of academic expression related to abortion. And other faculty members who have not altered their academic speech fear prosecution under the NPFAA because their teaching or scholarship continues to include viewpoints that may be construed as promoting or counseling in favor of abortion.

Despite the Idaho Supreme Court upholding the state’s near-total ban on abortion in January 2023, parties continue to challenge the state’s strict abortion laws. Tuesday’s lawsuit comes just a week after a federal judge struck down Idaho’s ban on out-of-state abortion referrals.

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