From Gilley v. Stabin, decided yesterday by Judge Marco Hernández (D. Ore.):
Defendant tova stabin {[who] spells her name with all lowercase letters} was previously the Communication Manager for the Division of Equity and Inclusion … at the University of Oregon….
On or about June 14, 2022, Defendant stabin, in her capacity as Communication Manager, posted a "racism interruptor" to the Division's Twitter page, @UOEquity. The Tweet read "You can interrupt racism," and the prompt read, "It sounded like you just said_________. Is that really what you meant?"
Plaintiff Bruce Gilley, a professor at Portland State University, responded to the Tweet the same day it was posted with the entry "all men are created equal." Plaintiff is critical of diversity, equity, and inclusion ("DEI") principles, and intended his tweet to promote a colorblindness viewpoint. Plaintiff tagged @uoregon and @UOEquity in his re-tweet. Also on June 14, 2022, Defendant stabin blocked Plaintiff from the @UOEquity account. Once he was blocked, Plaintiff could no longer view, reply to, or retweet any of @UOEquity's posts….
Gilley sued, and the court allowed the lawsuit to go forward; the court concluded that the comments to the @UOEquity account were a "limited public forum," where any government-imposed restrictions had to be viewpoint-neutral and reasonable, and "Plaintiff raises serious questions on the merits of his claim that Defendant stabin violated his First Amendment rights when she blocked him on Twitter."
