Twelve students in Department of Defense-run schools on military bases are suing the agency for alleged book removals and curricular changes they say violates their First Amendment rights.
Led by the ACLU, two of the families involved in the lawsuit live in Kentucky and attend the Barsanti Elementary School in Fort Campbell as well as families based in Virginia, Italy and Japan.
The ACLU is asking the court to block the Trump administration from removing books and curricula based on the government’s viewpoint on “gender ideology” or “divisive concepts” from the 161 schools under the jurisdiction of the Department of Defense Education Activity.
One of three executive orders used to justify the removals is entitled “Restoring America’s Fighting Force.” It requires Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem to review the “leadership, curriculum, and instructors” of the defense department’s schools.
“In addition, these institutions shall be required to teach that America and its founding documents remain the most powerful force for good in human history,” the January executive order reads.
The ACLU’s complaint, filed in a Virginia federal court, says the department can’t unilaterally scrub materials with “no regard to how canonical, award-winning, or age-appropriate the material might be.”
“Public school districts cannot suppress educationally valuable books and materials about race and gender in public schools simply because a new presidential administration finds certain viewpoints on those topics to be politically incorrect,” the filing read.
Clarksville Now reported in February that Fort Campbell librarians were “scrubbing for books that contain references to slavery, the civil rights movement and anything else related to diversity, equity and inclusion” in order to comply with Trump’s orders.
The schools were also told to ban celebration of cultural observances like Black History Month, Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month and Hispanic Heritage Month. That included removing existing bulletin boards celebrating Black leaders like Martin Luther King Jr., Harriet Tubman and Rosa Parks, according to Clarksville Now.
DoDEA spokesperson Michael O’Day said in a statement that he can’t comment on active litigation, but the department is committed to creating “an exceptional educational experience.”
“Our curriculum, rigorously aligned with DoDEA’s proven standards, has earned us the distinction of being the top-ranked school system in the United States for four consecutive years, based on the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), the Nation’s Report Card,” O’Day said. “These standards promote academic excellence, critical thinking, and a learning environment that empowers all military-connected students to excel.”
Natalie Tolley, who is part of the lawsuit on behalf of her child enrolled in an Italy DoDEA school, said in a statement the removals are being implemented without due process or parental input.
“I have three daughters, and they, like all children, deserve access to books that both mirror their own life experiences and that act as windows that expose them to greater diversity,” Tolley said. “The administration has now made that verboten in DoDEA schools.”
It is unclear which books exactly are under review or have been removed from DoDEA schools. Various news outlets have reported that books like “The Kite Runner” by Khaled Hosseini,“The Antiracist Kid” by Tiffany Jewell, a preparation guide for the AP Psychology exam and “To Kill a Mockingbird” have all been under review and “quarantined” under the executive orders.
According to the Associated Press, the U.S. Naval Academy has removed almost 400 books from library shelves. The New York Times reports that Maya Angelou’s “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings,” which describes the American poet’s childhood struggles with racism and trauma, and “Memorializing the Holocaust” on female victims of the genocide have been removed in the purge. Meanwhile, two copies of Adolf Hitler’s “Mein Kampf” remain.
This is not the first time the DoDEA has come under fire from critics due to changes made under presidential priorities. Under the Biden administration, the agency came under scrutiny for its diversity, equity and inclusion efforts.
Last year, 18 members of Congress wrote to the then-defense secretary, asking him to “address the ongoing attempted radical indoctrination of our service members’ children.” They criticized the administration for encouraging teachers to read books like “How to be an Antiracist” and for incorporating social and emotional learning practices, which teach students to better understand their emotions and empathize with others.
The ACLU lawsuit is one of many currently levied at the Trump administration over the broad reaching executive orders, including several overt attempts to purge diversity and inclusion efforts from the government.
State government and politics reporting is supported in part by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.
