The litigious teacher and two students are from Little Rock Central High School, the site of the 1957 racial desegregation crisis. Their lawsuit reportedly stems from the state's decision last year that an Advanced Placement course on African American Studies would not count toward state credit, and they argue the ban on critical race theory (CRT) – which is included in a comprehensive education law known as the LEARNS Act– violates the First and Fourteenth Amendments.
David Cox of the Arkansas-based Family Council says his conservative organization supports the law because it addresses "very serious concerns" about CRT, racial indoctrination, and "our public schools being hijacked to promote this agenda that we're seeing nationwide."
"One of the problems that's being overlooked here is that the section of the law that they're challenging deals with a lot more than just critical race theory," he tells AFN. "This lawsuit could give a court an opportunity not just to block this one section of the law and bring critical race theory into Arkansas public schools, but they also could, if they wanted to, block parts of this law that also address explicit sexual material in elementary school, sex education in elementary school, and other issues that parents have a lot of concern about."
Governor Sarah Sanders (R-Arkansas), who signed the LEARNS Act into law on March 8, 2023, has responded to the lawsuit by pledging Arkansas "will not indoctrinate our kids and teach them to hate America or each other."
She also says it is "sad the radical Left continues to lie and play political games with our kids' futures."
Likewise, Attorney General Tim Griffin (R) has said, "The LEARNS Act has brought much-needed reforms to Arkansas. I have successfully defended [the law] from challenges before, and I am prepared to vigorously defend it again."
This lawsuit is the second challenge against the measure, which also created a new school voucher program. In October, the state Supreme Court rejected a challenge to the law that questioned the legislature's procedural vote that allowed it to take effect immediately.
