Investigation · Criminalization of Dissent Hub

The State of Texas v. freedom of speech.

“These protesters belong in jail.” One governor, one state, and a stack of tools — an executive order, a loyalty oath for contractors, state troopers, and the threat of pulling a city's funding — aimed at the same target: protest of Israel.

This page documents what the State of Texas actually did, and the First Amendment challenges those actions drew. It credits the stated purpose — confronting a real rise in antisemitism — and it takes no side on any protest slogan. What it tracks is narrower and verifiable: the use of state power to attach professional, academic, and legal risk to one political viewpoint.

The record ↓Where we draw the line

§1 · Summary Brief

What this page is about

Since 2017, Texas has assembled an unusually complete toolkit for raising the cost of pro-Palestinian advocacy. A 2017 statute requires state contractors to certify they will not boycott Israel. A March 2024 executive order directs every public university to adopt a specific definition of antisemitism and to punish — up to expulsion — named student groups and a named slogan. In April 2024, more than a hundred state troopers cleared a University of Texas encampment and arrested roughly eighty people, with the governor declaring they “belong in jail.” And in 2025, the state threatened to defund a city over a ceasefire resolution.

Each of these is documented — in the statute books, the governor's own orders and posts, and court filings. Each has also drawn a First Amendment challenge, from a fired school speech pathologist to CAIR to the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee. We lay out the actions and the litigation, and we are careful to separate what the state did (fact) from whether it was constitutional (contested, and in court).

What we are NOT saying

We are not claiming the concern about antisemitism is fabricated — the post-October-7 rise was real, and some conduct at some protests was genuinely antisemitic. We take no position on the slogan “from the river to the sea”; we report only that the state deemed it sanctionable and that plaintiffs defend it as protected speech. And we do not declare these measures unconstitutional ourselves — that question is being decided by the courts, and we report where it stands.

The record, in order

4 entries · scroll →

Every dated event on this page, assembled chronologically. The page may cover events in a different order for the narrative; this is the straight timeline.

§2 · The Record

Five instruments, one target

Executive Order GA-44: adopt a definition, punish a slogan, name the groups.

FACT

On March 27, 2024, Gov. Greg Abbott issued Executive Order GA-44, directing every public college and university in Texas to revise its free-speech policies to 'address the sharp rise in antisemitic speech and acts,' to adopt the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) working definition of antisemitism, and to establish 'appropriate punishments,' expressly including expulsion. The order names two student organizations — the Palestine Solidarity Committee and Students for Justice in Palestine — and singles out the slogan 'from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free.' We take no position on the slogan; we report that the state directed universities to discipline students for it. Academic-freedom groups — the Middle East Studies Association's academic-freedom committee, the Texas AAUP, and the American Council of Trustees and Alumni — objected that the order compels universities to punish protected political speech.

The lawsuit: CAIR sued the governor and two universities over GA-44.

FACT

In May 2024, the Council on American-Islamic Relations sued Gov. Abbott and administrators of the University of Houston and the University of Texas on behalf of local chapters of Students for Justice in Palestine and the Democratic Socialists of America, arguing that GA-44 and the campus policies built on it amount to illegal viewpoint discrimination that suppresses criticism of Israel. We report the filing and its First Amendment theory; the case is one of the venues in which the constitutionality of these measures is being decided, and we do not pre-judge the outcome.

The anti-BDS oath: a speech pathologist fired, a law enjoined, then narrowed to survive.

FACT

Texas House Bill 89 (2017) requires state contractors to certify in writing that they do not and will not boycott Israel; it passed the House 131-0 and the Senate 25-4. In 2018 Bahia Amawi, a children's speech pathologist for the Pflugerville school district, lost her contract for refusing to sign. In April 2019 U.S. District Judge Robert Pitman blocked the law, finding it a likely 'content- and viewpoint-based restriction on protected expression,' compelled speech, an unconstitutional condition on public employment, and void for vagueness. Rather than accept the ruling, Texas amended the statute in 2019 to apply only to companies with at least ten employees and contracts of $100,000 or more — exempting individuals like Amawi — after which the Fifth Circuit dismissed the challenge as moot. The honest status: struck down as applied to individuals, narrowed to sidestep the ruling, and still in force for larger contractors.

'These protesters belong in jail': ~80 arrested at UT, then 57 charges dropped.

FACT

During pro-Palestinian demonstrations at the University of Texas at Austin in April 2024, more than a hundred Department of Public Safety troopers — deployed at the university's request and, in the governor's words, at his direction — cleared the protests, and roughly eighty people were arrested across April 24 and 29. Gov. Abbott posted on X that 'these protesters belong in jail' and that students joining 'hate-filled, antisemitic protests' should be expelled. The arrests did not hold up: criminal charges were dropped against 57 of those arrested, and the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee filed a federal suit alleging unlawful mass arrests and retaliatory discipline. We report the deployment, the quote, the arrests, and the dropped charges as the record shows them.

“These protesters belong in jail. — Gov. Greg Abbott, April 2024”

Defund the dissent: the state threatened San Marcos over a ceasefire resolution.

FACT

In spring 2025, as the city of San Marcos considered a resolution calling for a Gaza ceasefire, Gov. Abbott sent Mayor Jane Hughson a letter warning that if the council adopted it, 'the Office of the Governor will not enter into any future grant agreements with the city and will act swiftly to terminate active grants for non-compliance,' asserting the resolution would violate Texas's anti-boycott law. After the threat, the city council rejected the resolution 5-2 on May 6, 2025. We report the letter and the vote; the state's use of grant funding to deter a municipal political statement is the documented fact, and readers can weigh what it means.

§3 · Where We Draw the Line

What this page does — and refuses to do

We credit the stated purpose. Antisemitism is real and rose sharply after October 7, 2023; some conduct at some protests genuinely crossed into it. Confronting that is a legitimate aim, and we say so plainly.
We take no position on the slogan. Whether “from the river to the sea” is a call for coexistence or for something darker is fiercely contested. We do not adjudicate it; we report that the state ordered students punished for it and that plaintiffs call that protected speech.
Actions are fact; constitutionality is in court. The order, the statute, the arrests, and the letters happened — that is not in dispute. Whether they cross the First Amendment is being litigated, and we report the rulings rather than issue our own verdict.
We tell the anti-BDS story straight. A federal court found the original loyalty oath unconstitutional; Texas then narrowed it to survive. Leaving out either half would mislead, so we include both.

§4 · Why It Matters

One viewpoint, four kinds of consequence

What makes Texas a case study is not any single measure but the combination: a contractor can lose a livelihood, a student can lose a place at a public university, a demonstrator can be arrested, and a city can lose its state grants — all keyed to the same political position. That is the pattern this archive exists to document: the machinery by which lawful dissent is made costly. It sits in the Criminalization of Dissent hub beside other cases of the state reaching for coercive tools against protest, and cross-links the Israeli Influence hub, where the policy pressure behind these measures is tracked. None of it requires assuming bad faith about the fight against antisemitism — the documented reach of the tools is the story.

§5 · FAQ

Questions worth taking seriously

Isn't the state just fighting antisemitism?

That is its stated purpose, and we credit it — antisemitism rose sharply after October 7, and some protest conduct crossed into it. The First Amendment question the courts and plaintiffs raise is narrower: whether the state can adopt a specific definition, punish a named slogan and named groups up to expulsion, condition contracts and city grants on a political position, and mass-arrest demonstrators — or whether that sweeps in protected speech. We document both the aim and the challenge.

Is the anti-BDS law constitutional or not?

Both answers are partly true, which is why we spell it out. A federal judge found the original 2017 law unconstitutional as applied to an individual contractor (Bahia Amawi) in 2019. Texas then amended it to cover only companies with 10+ employees and contracts of $100,000+, exempting individuals — and the Fifth Circuit dismissed the challenge as moot. So the individual-level version was struck; the narrowed business-level version remains in force and has not been struck down.

Are you taking a side on 'from the river to the sea'?

No. Its meaning is genuinely contested, and this page doesn't resolve it. We report a narrower, verifiable fact: Executive Order GA-44 directs public universities to treat the slogan as sanctionable antisemitism, and the plaintiffs argue that punishing students for a political chant is viewpoint discrimination. Whether the slogan is benign or menacing is a debate we leave to the reader.

§6 · Standing Invitation

If you are named on this page

If you are named on this page and believe we have a fact wrong, or have characterized an action unfairly, we want to hear from you and we will correct the record. This page is built from statutes, official executive orders and statements, and court filings, and it credits the state's stated aim of combating antisemitism while reporting the First Amendment challenges. Reach us through the contact channels on our mission page.

§7 · Sources