Texas State University: RAs Punished for Speaking to The University Star Student Newspaper

On October 18, 2022, Texas State University issued written warnings to three of its student-employees because they spoke with The University Star, the campus newspaper. Texas State’s employee media policy prevents employees from speaking to the media without administrative approval, even in their personal capacity on issues of public concern. On December 28, FIRE wrote Texas State urging it to revise this policy to comply with its First Amendment obligations to respect the expressive rights of student-employees. On January 13, 2023, Texas State responded, and confirmed that it had removed the written warnings from the RAs’ personnel files.