Court Reinstates School District Employees’ Free Speech Lawsuit Over Anti-Racism Training

Authored by Matthew Vadum via The Epoch Times,

A divided federal appeals court voted to revive a lawsuit by school district employees who say they were forced to self-censor and make statements they disagreed with to finish so-called anti-racism training.

On Dec. 30, 2025, the full U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit voted 6–5 in Henderson v. Springfield R-12 School District to reactivate the employees’ lawsuit, holding that the chilling effect from the mandatory 2020 training gave them standing to sue for First Amendment violations.

Standing refers to the right of someone to sue in court. The parties must show a strong enough connection to the claim to justify their participation in a lawsuit.

The district court had previously found that because the employees of the Springfield, Missouri, school district were not punished for disagreeing with the training’s content and were allowed to express their own views, they did not suffer an injury and therefore did not have standing. That court found the plaintiffs’ claims were weak and awarded attorney’s fees to the school district. A panel of the Eighth Circuit affirmed the dismissal for lack of standing but found the plaintiffs’ claims were not frivolous, so it overturned the award of attorney’s fees.

The full Eighth Circuit reversed the dismissal and sent the case back to the federal district court for reconsideration.

Plaintiffs Brooke Henderson and Jennifer Lumley sued in 2021, alleging that while attending a compulsory district-wide equity training program for staff, the school district engaged in viewpoint-based discrimination, caused them to self-censor, and forced them to accept beliefs they rejected.

For example, a PowerPoint presentation told the plaintiffs they had to do things such as “Lean into your discomfort,” “Acknowledge YOUR privileges,” and “Hold YOURSELF accountable,” Circuit Judge Ralph Erickson wrote in the majority opinion.

The plaintiffs argued that the training was “essentially an indoctrination focused on the school district’s views and its interpretation of white supremacy.” The district expected staff members to adhere to its definition of white supremacy, which it defined as “the all-encompassing centrality and assumed superiority of people defined and perceived as white.” An “oppression matrix” slide shown during a presentation listed “racism, sexism, transgender oppression, heterosexism, classism, ableism, religious oppression, and ageism/adultism,” as “types of oppression,” the opinion said.

The district taught staff that American culture “positions white people and all that is associated with them (whiteness) as ideal.”

The district said during trainings that “silence from white people is a form of ‘white supremacy’” and indicated that it would not tolerate the plaintiffs rejecting the materials being taught, according to the opinion.

“It is of little consequence that ultimately no one was forced to leave the training, and the school district did not reduce anyone’s pay because a plaintiff is not required to first suffer a consequence before she may bring a claim,” the opinion said.

“The harm is in the suppression of the speech itself,” Erickson wrote.

Chief Circuit Judge Steven Colloton wrote in his dissenting opinion that the plaintiffs failed to establish they suffered an injury and therefore lacked standing to sue.

“A public employee is not injured in a constitutional sense by enduring a two-hour training program with which the employee disagrees,” he said.

The plaintiffs experienced “no tangible harm,” took home full pay, and received professional development credit for their attendance, Colloton wrote, adding that Lumley earned a promotion soon after the training.

The Southeastern Legal Foundation, a nonprofit that represents the plaintiffs, said the decision by the federal appeals court was “a huge victory for the First Amendment.”

“We are hopeful it gives others the courage to fight back against discriminatory equity trainings,” the foundation said.

The Epoch Times reached out to the school district for comment. No reply was received by publication time.