Teacher’s Lawsuit Against Moms For Liberty Should Be Dismissed
JACKSONVILLE, FL – Liberty Counsel filed a motion in federal court on behalf of Moms for Liberty to dismiss a baseless lawsuit brought by a Duval County teacher who alleges the nonprofit harmed her reputation by requesting a school district investigation into her social media posts.
In 2025, Moms for Liberty’s Duval chapter emailed Duval County Public Schools and the Florida Department of Education with screenshots of the teacher’s public social media posts that celebrated the assassination of Charlie Kirk. Moms for Liberty simply requested officials review whether the posts aligned with the professional standards of public school employees. Officials later opened an investigation and subsequently placed the teacher on administrative leave.
The teacher, Hope McMath, claims the communication from Moms for Liberty to school officials caused her professional and reputational harm. While McMath dropped an initial claim of defamation, she continues to claim wrongful interference and malicious prosecution.
However, Liberty Counsel seeks to dismiss the case because the emails to school officials were truthful, legally protected speech calling attention to the teacher’s public social media posts (screenshots), and were part of Moms for Liberty’s right to petition the government. McMath’s interference claim is untenable as a matter of law since all Moms for Liberty did, as a citizen organization, was report a public employee’s own public statements to the officials charged with supervising her. It was school officials that had control and authority, and made independent decisions to review the posts and put her on administrative leave.
Under the law, a defendant does not “instigate” an administrative action or wrongfully interfere by “merely giving a statement to proper authorities” where the discretion to investigate and act lies solely with the government officials, wrote Liberty Counsel.
As for malicious prosecution, that claim also cannot proceed because the underlying administrative matter has not yet been resolved by the school district in the teacher’s favor, a requirement for such a claim, wrote Liberty Counsel.
In the motion, Liberty Counsel also noted that McMath’s lawsuit qualifies as a prohibited Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation (SLAPP), which are lawsuits meant to intimidate or silence others from exercising their First Amendment rights, and entitles Moms for Liberty to recover attorney’s fees and costs for having to defend against this lawsuit.
Liberty Counsel’s Founder and Chairman Mat Staver said, “This lawsuit is meritless because it seeks to impose liability for conduct that is fully protected under the law. The only actions attributed to Moms for Liberty involve providing truthful, publicly available information to the appropriate government agencies and allowing those agencies to make their own independent decisions."