Federal judge allows IU ‘bias incident’ policy to remain
INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — Indiana University can continue to use its “bias incident” reporting policy, a federal judge in Indianapolis has ruled.
On Wednesday, Judge James Hanlon rejected a request by Speech First to block IU’s Bias Response and Education Initiative.
Speech First, a nationwide group representing conservative students, says its mission is “to protect the rights of students and others at colleges and universities.”
Speech First sued IU in May on behalf of five students who are “politically conservative and hold views that are unpopular, controversial, and in the minority on campus.”
IU’s policy allows students to report potential bias incidents, including “any conduct, speech, or expression, motivated in whole or in part by bias or prejudice meant to intimidate, demean, mock, degrade, marginalize, or threaten individuals or groups based on that individual or group’s actual or perceived identities.”
The university says students are not required to participate in reviews of the bias reports, and that the review committee does not make findings on the report and can not sanction or discipline students.
The lawsuit alleged IU’s policy violates the First and Fourteenth Amendments to the US Constitution.
“Indiana University has a history of hostility towards views that dissent from the dominant ideology that rules their administration and faculty,” Cherise Trump, Speech First’s Executive Director, said when the suit was filed. “Indiana taxpayers should be furious that their hard-earned dollars are funding a tyrannical administration that has taken a page out of the playbook of history’s most oppressive regimes.”
Judge Hanlon’s ruling cited a federal appeals court ruling in a previous Speech First lawsuit that found the group lacked legal standing to get a preliminary injunction on a similar bias incident policy at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
Speech First has indicated it will appeal in both cases.