A Florida Atlantic University professor who was placed on leave over social media posts he made about Charlie Kirk\u2019s opponents has filed a federal lawsuit against the university\u2019s leaders, saying they violated his First Amendment rights. <\/p>\n
Dr. Rebel Cole, an eminent scholar in the College of Business, filed the lawsuit Wednesday against FAU President Adam Hasner and several other top university officials who he said were behind his suspension in September.<\/p>\n
Cole was suspended by the university in September over posts he had made on his personal X account following Charlie Kirk\u2019s assassination, in which he said those celebrating the assassination were inciting riots and threatened to \u201chunt (them) down\u201d and make them \u201cboth unemployed and unemployable,\u201d according to the lawsuit filed Wednesday. An anonymous complainant had sent screenshots of several of Cole\u2019s posts to FAU the day before his suspension. He has remained on administrative leave ever since.<\/p>\n
\u201cDr. Cole is still prohibited from teaching his classes, working with doctoral students on their theses, engaging in faculty duties, attending university sponsored events, and stepping foot on FAU\u2019s campus because he exercised his rights to free speech under the U.S. and Florida constitutions,\u201d his attorneys wrote in a federal complaint. In addition to Cole, FAU suspended two other faculty members over social media comments following Kirk\u2019s assassination in September. Unlike Cole, the two professors, art history professor Karen Leader and English professor Kate Polak, were both suspended for comments they made against Kirk himself, rather than his opponents. Neither professor has filed a lawsuit against the university, according to federal court records.<\/p>\n
FAU, through an attorney, told Cole in a Sept. 15 letter that he was being placed on leave because his \u201ccontinued presence on the job adversely affects university operations\u201d and that his social media posts were being investigated because the university believes they \u201cmight disrupt the efficient functioning of the University, and\/or jeopardize the safety or welfare of other employees, colleagues, or students.\u201d In the lawsuit, Cole argued that FAU, a public university acting as the state, violated his First Amendment right to comment on issues in his capacity as a private citizen on his personal social media page.<\/p>\n
The social media posts in question came as a response to a video posted on X depicting a man chanting \u201cwe got Charlie in the neck,\u201d according to the lawsuit. Another user argued that the chant was free speech. When Cole argued back that it was not, the user said \u201cno one is afraid of you.\u201d \u201cWe are going to hunt you down,\u201d Cole wrote back. \u201cWe are going to identify you. Then we are going to make you radioactive to polite society. And we will make you both unemployed and unemployable.\u201d The anonymous complainant also submitted posts in which Cole discussed \u201cthe importance of private gun ownership under the Second Amendment (specifically self-defense after Kirk\u2019s murder)\u201d and the high-profile killing of a woman on a train in Charlotte, North Carolina, according to the lawsuit.<\/p>\n
Cole\u2019s suspension and subsequent media attention also caused him emotional distress, according to the complaint, leading him to receive death threats, while he and his wife were ostracized from their church in Delray Beach. This week, Cole was forbidden from attending a finance and real estate conference at FAU that he had personally founded in 2024 because he is still unable to set foot on the school\u2019s campus. The lawsuit requests that Cole be reinstated to his position at FAU and receive monetary damages.<\/p>\n
FAU \u201cacted illegally to strip me of my 1st Amendment rights,\u201d Cole wrote on X Friday. \u201cWe are standing up for faculty across America. We cannot allow administrators to strip us of our 1st Amendment right. We will WIN.\u201d He declined to comment further when reached by the South Florida Sun Sentinel Friday. The attorney representing FAU referred a reporter to the university for comment. A spokesperson for FAU declined to comment on the lawsuit, saying the university does not comment on pending litigation. Cole\u2019s attorneys did not return a request for comment.<\/p>\n
Introduction to the Lawsuit A Florida Atlantic University professor who was placed on leave over social media posts he made about Charlie Kirk\u2019s opponents has filed a federal lawsuit against the university\u2019s leaders, saying they violated his First Amendment rights. Dr. Rebel Cole, an eminent scholar in the College of Business, filed the lawsuit Wednesday […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":22431,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rank_math_lock_modified_date":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-22429","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-education"},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.sun-sentinel.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/migration\/2019\/02\/28\/NFFSGOLSL5D7JMIG5GXVP7XLYQ.jpg?w=1400px&strip=all&w=841&resize=841,473&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/citystuff.com\/miami\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22429"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/citystuff.com\/miami\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/citystuff.com\/miami\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citystuff.com\/miami\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citystuff.com\/miami\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22429"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/citystuff.com\/miami\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22429\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22432,"href":"https:\/\/citystuff.com\/miami\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22429\/revisions\/22432"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citystuff.com\/miami\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22431"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/citystuff.com\/miami\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22429"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citystuff.com\/miami\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22429"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citystuff.com\/miami\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22429"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}