An internal Fort Worth ISD investigation determined that a Muslim educator’s social media posts did not violate district policy or Texas law, according to federal court documents.
A temporary reassignment was necessary for the safety of Shayma Alzubi and Western Hills High School staff after she received threatening messages, the district’s attorneys wrote. Alzubi’s attorneys noted her reassignment was made in anticipation of disruptions and threats to the school’s operations.
In mid-July filings, FWISD attorneys asked a federal judge to dismiss a lawsuit filed by Alzubi, who wants her job back as principal of Western Hills.
FWISD Investigation Results (With Watermark)Download
Alzubi’s lawsuit alleges FWISD violated her First Amendment guarantee of free speech and 14th Amendment equal protection rights by reassigning her after she made social media posts about Palestinians, Black Lives Matter, Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals recipients, Islam and the district’s COVID-19 mask policy that received online backlash.
"The online hecklers were upset that (Alzubi) was Palestinian and Muslim," Alzubi’s attorneys wrote.
Response to FWISD (With Watermark)Download
The district’s attorneys wrote that Alzubi was not being punished for the posts, because she continued to work under the reassignment. A First Amendment retaliation claim requires an action that would harm a person, such as a firing or demotion.
Instead, FWISD offered Alzubi a promotion that came with a $130,000 salary — nearly $10,000 more than the principal salary, according to court documents.
"The complaint does not identify any specific policy of Fort Worth ISD's board that allegedly caused a violation of Alzubi's First Amendment rights or resulted in retaliation for engaging in constitutionally protected speech,” FWISD attorneys wrote.
FWISD response (With Watermark)Download
FWISD attorneys argued that the sequence of events undercuts Alzubi’s claim. She alleged that FWISD knew about her posts before naming her Western Hills principal and promoting her further to a district-level position. Those moves “do not plausibly suggest any retaliatory intent by the district,” according to court documents.
The speed with which Alzubi was reassigned shows otherwise, her attorneys wrote. Her posts gained public attention on May 26, and she was reassigned by that afternoon. That move shows that her speech was a motivating factor, they wrote.
Alzubi’s attorneys said her social media activity was similar to posts by other FWISD employees who were not reassigned to other jobs. Online comments were directed at her identity as a Palestinian Muslim, according to court documents.
She “was targeted precisely because of who she is,” Alzubi’s attorneys wrote.
The district’s attorneys argued that Alzubi did not point to any specific employees or colleagues who posted about the same causes and kept their job but only noted that such employees exist.
“But even if she had adequately pleaded constitutional violations, her claims must still be dismissed because she entirely fails to allege facts from which the court can reasonably infer that an official policy or custom of Fort Worth ISD was the moving force behind those purported violations,” the district’s attorneys wrote.
U.S. District Judge Mark Pittman of the Northern District of Texas has not set a hearing on the district’s request to dismiss the suit.
Jacob Sanchez is education editor for the Fort Worth Report. Contact him at jacob.sanchez@fortworthreport.org or @_jacob_sanchez.
Disclosure: FWISD manager Pete Geren leads the Sid W. Richardson Foundation, a financial supporter of the Fort Worth Report. FWISD manager Laurie George is a member of the Report’s reader advisory council. At the Fort Worth Report, news decisions are made independently of our board members and financial supporters. Read more about our editorial independence policy here.
This article first appeared on Fort Worth Report and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
