Justice Department spokeswoman Sarah Isgur Flores said Thursday on CNN that the department was getting involved in the case because officials want “to protect against universities — the government really, if you’re a public university — deciding which speech is favored, which ideas are too controversial to even allow to be heard on a college campus.”
Attorney General Jeff Sessions has been outspoken about free speech on college campuses, and in advance of his department’s court filing, Associate Attorney General Rachel Brand penned a column for Fox News criticizing the practices at some colleges.
“Free speech is under attack at college campuses across the country,” Brand wrote. “The problem is not limited to a few colleges barring radical speakers to avoid a riot. Universities large and small, public and private, are restricting students’ and professors’ speech or enabling others to silence speech with which they disagree.”
