Tufts University: Use of Sexual Harassment Allegations to Suppress Protected Speech

A hearing panel at Tufts University unanimously voted to dismiss charges of sexual harassment against a student newspaper that had satirized a campus student leader. The Primary Source, a student publication that describes itself as the "Journal of Conservative Thought at Tufts University," turned to FIRE after an undergraduate student filed charges against the paper with both the Dean of Students and the Office of Equal Opportunity, claiming that a cartoon and written remarks in the journal of opinion had made her into a "sex object." In response, FIRE wrote to the administration, reminding them of two prior free speech cases at Tufts where FIRE successfully intervened.