There is no use in sugarcoating things. For higher education in America, 2025 was a year of catastrophe. Get all the details in PEN America's new report "America's Censored Campuses: Expanding the Web of Control" at: pen.org/report/ameri... #censorship #highereducation

Yesterday we @penamerica.bsky.social released a comprehensive study of government censorship of US higher ed in 2025. We discuss: - rampant educational gag orders & state laws - weaponization of federal gov to control academic research and teaching Highlights 👇

Publishers are feeling the chill of the book banning movement and a second Trump presidency as literary agents note a more reserved atmosphere for publishing books with LGBTQ+ characters and themes. More: https://thehill.com/homenews/lgbtq/5679251-trump-era-lgbtq-book-bans/

Both male and female horses have eyelashes. Unicorns don't exist so this can't be scientifically verified. Valiant use of taxpayer money to micromanage the acceptable eyelash representation of fictional animals.

News of clandestine book banning at Yosemite national Park. Against what else? A book about ecological decline with California waterways. Because this is somehow what the current admin opposes people learning about? www.sfgate.com/national-par...

Mixed day for free speech in Texas higher ed Texas Tech made a draconian policy that faculty can't teach about sex and gender unless it's to the letter of whatever the President says (!?) But Texas State reinstated prof with pay, who was fired for an extramural speech share.google/bXV8TM11EQR2...

Removing To Kill a Mockingbird and The House on Mango Street from Texas classrooms does not protect Texas kids. The Texas GOP and Governor Abbott need to answer for this. Shameful. www.fox7austin.com/news/leander...

A victory for free speech. Now let's hope, as @jimmykimmel.com called for, people also raise their voices for other free speech, academic freedom, press freedom cases. For the ppl that don't have the same prominence. Lord knows there are enough of 'em! www.nytimes.com/2025/09/26/b...

This is the offending monologue from @jimmykimmel.com , begins at the 2 minute mark. Watch the clip and ask yourself when did this become forbidden speech on American TV? www.youtube.com/watch?v=-j3Y...

Alberta, goddamn. share.google/El4Mbh9HWxMf...

State BOE Member Byrd recommended districts skip the review process and go right to removing every title on their shelves that has appeared on the state’s annual removal lists. Well, it appears Volusia listened. Here are 10 of the disappeared titles we have been monitoring, now banned in Volusia.

I just shared this with Dr. Bhattacharya and colleagues...

My latest commentary, in @slj.com with @tasslyn.bsky.social on the Mahmoud v Taylor decision. These wonderful books -- and their authors -- deserved better.

"We would not expect schools to put Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day in the sex education curriculum simply because it features a straight mom and dad. Why would Justice Gorsuch or others believe stories about families with two moms or two dads belong there?"

Last night, Hillsborough County Public Schools held its first school board meeting since letters from state officials ordered books off shelves. Two parents made particularly poignant statements that must be heard. You can watch the whole meeting here: www.hillsboroughschools.org/Page/6365

Talk about L is for LEAP. How “Pride Puppy!” - a children’s alphabet book - came to the center of a SCOTUS case w/ high stakes for access to books & education, involves "a pretty disturbing interpretation," says @robinstevenson.bsky.social. The "backlash is such evidence of need for these books."

“‘Aggressively revoking’ visas based on political ideology is a gross violation of basic free expression principles that anchor the academy,” @jonfreadom.bsky.social, PEN America's managing director of U.S. free expression, tells Inside Higher Ed www.insidehighered.com/news/global/...

A FL public library considering pulling out books about "life issues" to a separate section. Except it's defined so incredibly brutally it's basically books about any topic someone might want to censor.

Revoking Harvard's right to enroll international students is "a brazen escalation of the Trump administration’s attacks on the higher education sector... (that) reduces international students to pawns in a political game," says PEN America's @jonfreadom.bsky.social. pen.org/press-releas...

Trump's vile ban on foreign students at Harvard comes as an AP poll finds large majorities disapprove of his treatment of colleges. He's getting them to band together and he's making them *more* popular with the public. On the pod, @jonfreadom.bsky.social explains: newrepublic.com/article/1956...

Report from today’s hearing in the Middle District case PRH v. Gibson: The state stuck to the argument that our libraries are “government speech” and students, parents, educators, authors, and publishers have no reasonable expectation to access particular ideas or to have their ideas endorsed.

South Carolina has voted to ban 10 more books in public schools statewide, raising the total to 22. This makes it the leading state for mandated book bans in every K-12 public school, replacing Utah, which currently has mandated bans on 18 books statewide. pen.org/press-releas...

This is among the more thinly- veiled censorship rationales I've seen in a while. NYC Mayor's office pressured City Parks Foundation to cancel Kehlani at SummerStage b/c of "the controversy" related to them being cancelled at Cornell... construed as a "safety" issue. www.nytimes.com/2025/05/05/n...

“What we’re seeing now is very dangerous,” said PEN America's @jonfreadom.bsky.social. “When you attach these punitive potential actions to these concepts, you can comb through anything a university is doing and find fault.” www.nytimes.com/2025/05/05/a...

The decision in Alabama may have been the first time a local public library was targeted for defunding by a state government, said @jonfreadom.bsky.social, who directs U.S. free expression programs at the nonprofit PEN America. www.nytimes.com/2025/05/04/u...

There's still an adult in the room in North Dakota. Republican Gov Armstrong has done the reasonable thing and vetoed a bill that would censor libraries, saying it represented a "misguided attempt to legislate morality through overreach and censorship". More of this pls 🙏 apnews.com/article/nort...

U.S. Naval Academy Silences Speaker Over Criticism of Book Bans: “A Tragic New Low,” says PEN America's @jonfreadom.bsky.social pen.org/press-releas...

What a boob. 😜 www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

Harvard’s pushback against the Trump administration "is a game changer," @jonfreadom.bsky.social tells @gregsargent.bsky.social. "It says to every institution that is feeling like they have to capitulate that there is something greater that they have to stand for." podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/t...

This was my high-school & I'm not shocked but I'm saddened. I read that book in high school and it shook me, but it was really important and imprinted on me. This school was a tough place for me. Shout out to Ms. Mo (journalism) for teaching me my rights & encouraging me to stand up for what's right

The US Naval Academy is banning books from its library, including about the Holocaust. Books are not the enemy; ignorance is the enemy. apnews.com/article/navy...

The hoops being jumped through in Elizabeth, Colorado to keep 19 books banned from students -- despite a judge's order they must now be returned to the shelves-- are something out of a circus. www.chalkbeat.org/colorado/202...

381 books banned from the Naval Academy. College level library. Banning books. All about race, racism, gender. #11 on the list is 'Our Time is Now' by Stacey Abrams. @staceyabrams.com Many others worth noting here. @penamerica.bsky.social

Your moment of resistance this week comes from Tufts president Sunil Kumar. Who submitted this statement in support of the legal team fighting the detention of grad student Rümeysa Öztürk. Hoping more college presidents stand up for students and follow this example. www.tufts.edu/president/sp...

South Carolina State Board of Education members question the mechanisms giving one person power to ban books state wide and table the decision to remove 10 more titles from schools. bookriot.com/south-caroli...

PEN America, @pencanada.bsky.social, and @penquebec.bsky.social Jointly Call for Books and Literature to Flow Freely Across the Shared Border: pen.org/press-releas...

The world is still on fire but it was really nice to not have one of my books banned in South Carolina today

We have a lot of fun here in these United States, but I gotta be honest, gang, as a trans American, I do, from time to time, get sick of being called a secret pedophile by a bunch of secret pedophiles.

Book banning comes to the Naval Academies: "...the review of Nimitz Library’s holdings has identified 900 books that may run afoul of the defense secretary’s verbal order...." including books about Martin Luther King Jr., Einstein, and Jackie Robinson. www.nytimes.com/2025/03/28/u...

Book banners have lost court case after court case. Because they’re lying to you. www.dailytrib.com/2025/03/28/e...

Advocates for academic freedom are warning the crisis at universities creates a problem for the country as a whole. “It feels like any day, any university could step out of line in some way and then have all of their funding pulled,” said @jonfreadom.bsky.social. www.pbs.org/newshour/edu...

Policy for Choosing School Books in Minnesota District is a “Recipe for Censorship,” says @jonfreadom.bsky.social. PEN America's response to two lawsuits filed today against St. Francis Area School District, calling for an end to the Minnesota district’s illegal book bans: pen.org/press-releas...

MN is a “blue” state with a Freedom to Read law, and this is still happening. In Florida, SB 1692 seeks to deny its citizens the ability to consider literary, artistic, political, and scientific value because that “loophole” has allowed for retention of books like The Kite Runner in HS libraries.

Good news out of Colorado! A Federal judge orders Colorado district to return banned books to school libraries. Good work! www.denverpost.com/2025/03/19/e...

Local communities - you are THE BEST. It's an honor to work for books and authors. Remember - MN is a "blue state" cc @heykellyjensen.bsky.social @kellybarnhill.bsky.social @aabbri.bsky.social @flfreedomread.bsky.social @txfreedomread.bsky.social www.fox9.com/news/st-fran...

We are sending people for indefinite detention without trial at a foreign gulag because they have tattoos about soccer teams and about loving their mothers.

Words related to DEI, climate change, vaccines and a host of other topics are being scrubbed from government websites. “How can we have intelligent or difficult conversations if we can’t even use the words, the most basic unit of meaning?” asks @jonfreadom.bsky.social More: pen.org/banned-words...

I had the sudden urge to edit the taglines on old "Read" posters.

“A number of people in elected office have gotten extraordinarily comfortable with the idea that they should use that office to control the spread of ideas and information,” said @jonfreadom.bsky.social. “And... that’s what makes all of this so dangerous.” www.nytimes.com/2025/03/20/u...