The louder leftists screech “book banner,” “tyrant,” and “destroyer of democracy,” the closer you should look at what their grimy hands are doing. They have a fetid barrel-full of sleight-of-hand and forked-tongue tricks. Their book-banning far exceeds in scope the requests by conservative parents to prevent minors from accessing obscene material in publicly funded libraries.
But that’s not all. Leftists ban ideas. They ban speakers. They ban words. And they ban backpacks.
Last week, Advocates for Faith and Freedom, a non-profit law firm committed to protecting religious liberty, filed a lawsuit on behalf of Alyssa Esquivel, a former American Sign Language aide at Del Mar High School in San Gabriel, California, who was suspended without pay for bringing a backpack that had the word “Trump” on it amid stars and stripes and a water bottle that had stickers of Trump and references to her Christian faith.
The saga all began in May 2023 with a decorated water bottle that another aide could not abide. According to the LA Times, a colleague of Esquivel’s moved Esquivel’s water bottle, “saying she ‘didn’t want Trump looking’ at her.”
When Esquivel dared to bring her (gasp) water bottle again the next day, the easily-triggered, unhinged colleague,
flipped over a desk, yelling that Esquivel was trying to “taunt” her by bringing the water bottle to school again. This allegedly prompted a meeting with the principal, a teacher, Esquivel and two other aides in which the principal affirmed that Esquivel could continue bringing her water bottle to school. … The other aides, however, allegedly refused to work with Esquivel—to the detriment of deaf students who couldn’t follow what was being taught she claimed. She filed a formal discrimination claim with the district that month.
Overturning desks and yelling (or in my experience at Deerfield High School, name-calling, swearing, and slander) is what leftist collegiality looks like in public schools.
Next, Principal Muhammad Abdul-Qawi, clearly a celebrant of tolerance, diversity, and inclusion, noticed Esquivel’s backpack and “told her not to bring the backpack or the water bottle to campus again. … The principal also allegedly rebuked her for wearing “‘American flag-themed jewelry.’”
A backpack with the name Trump and patriotic jewelry on a taxpayer-funded school campus? Anti-banning leftists can’t have that. Wouldn’t be prudent. So, in a three-hour meeting, the inclusive Abdul-Qawi told Esquivel that she could bring the backpack and water bottle to school as long as no one could see them. Where is a cloak of invisibility when you need one?
Esquivel continued to bring her backpack and water bottle to school until she was ordered not to “wear ‘political attire’” at which point she covered the letters “mp” and carried her “TRU” backpack to school.
Hoo boy, that did not sit well with a “district official”:
The district official threatened Esquivel with “fines and imprisonment,” banned her from campus and put her on paid leave. … Esquivel claimed police officers escorted her off school grounds.
According to the Orange County Register, the district tried to rationalize its bigotry and First Amendment violations by citing a state law and a district policy, neither of which applied:
Officials cited state law, which says no school district’s “services, supplies, or equipment shall be used for the purpose of urging the support or defeat of any ballot measure or candidate.”
Further, teachers and staffers are not allowed to wear buttons or clothing expressing political opinions on ballot measures or candidates during instructional time.
Neither Esquivel’s backpack nor water bottle were district supplies or equipment. And she wore no buttons or clothing expressing political opinions.
The OC Register reported that “In April, district officials moved forward to dismiss Esquivel.”
Advocates for Faith and Freedom allege that the San Gabriel Unified School District’s actions “constitute unconstitutional content and viewpoint discrimination in violation of the First and Fourteenth Amendments.”
Further, the law firm “requests, on behalf of Ms. Esquivel, that the District immediately reinstate Ms. Esquivel to her aide position. The organization also requests that there exists no permanent record of this incident or Ms. Esquivel’s leave.”
It should be shocking that a publicly funded school district would engage in such censorship and violation of constitutional rights, but nothing leftists do to control the dissemination of ideas they hate shocks anymore.
Next time leftists try to gaslight you into believing conservatives are the party of democracy destruction, tell them to put this story in their bongs and smoke it.