ADC Reply Brief Exposes AB 715 as a Censorship Law, Not an Anti-Hate Measure, Ahead of December 17 Hearing

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
December 15, 2025
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San Jose, CA | The American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC), together with co-counsel, filed its reply brief in support of a preliminary injunction to block California’s AB 715 — a new law that weaponizes vague “antisemitism” standards to suppress classroom discussion of Palestine, Israel, and Zionism.

U.S. District Judge Noël Wise will hear arguments on December 17, 2025, in Andrea Prichett, et al. v. Gavin Newsom, et al. (No. 5:25-cv-09443-NW-NMC) in the Northern District of California.

“AB 715 could subject teachers to discipline for presenting basic facts about Israel’s occupation of Palestine, the negative impact of Israel’s creation on Palestinians, and the genocide in Gaza. That inhibits their ability to provide factually accurate classroom instruction, foster critical thinking, and create environments where students feel free to ask questions and engage in open discussions,” said Jenin Younes, ADC National Legal Director. “Our clients have already begun censoring themselves rather than risk investigations, discipline and reputational harm. The First Amendment does not permit the state to reclassify criticism of a foreign government as discrimination in order to prevent children from learning facts and ideas that are inconvenient to the message some groups want to send.”

ADC’s reply explains that AB 715 is unconstitutionally vague, over broad  and viewpoint-discriminatory, chilling teachers’ and students’ First Amendment rights by threatening investigations and sanctions for criticism of Israel and Zionism or for teaching Palestinian history. The law creates a new enforcement bureaucracy — the Office of Civil Rights and an Antisemitism Prevention Coordinator — while directing officials to rely on the federal National Strategy to Counter Antisemitism. Although AB 715 never defines antisemitism, it requires schools to follow the national strategy, which considers criticism of Israel and Zionism antisemitism.  

“California can and must protect Jewish students from real discrimination,” said Abed Ayoub, ADC National Executive Director. “But it cannot do so by banning honest teaching about Palestine, Israel, and Zionism or by turning classrooms into echo chambers for the government’s preferred narrative.”

The reply brief argues that AB 715 improperly folds political speech into discrimination law; authorizes sweeping investigations into teachers’ classroom speech; permits anonymous complaints that intensify the chilling effect; requires no showing of harm; and extends vague “factual accuracy” rules to contested political histories.

“AB 715’s entire point is to conflate criticism of Israel and Zionism into discrimination law, then deploy a new bureaucracy to punish that speech,” ADC’s National Legal Director, Jenin Younes, said. “Teachers have already faced meritless accusations for simply teaching about Palestine. This law makes such complaints far more likely to succeed and exacerbates the chilling effect.”

Plaintiffs — including individual public school teachers and LA Educators for Justice in Palestine — allege that AB 715 threatens their jobs and livelihoods by effectively prohibiting them from assigning materials or answering students’ questions that reflect Palestinian perspectives..

Plaintiffs’ amici underscore that AB 715 is not about stopping discrimination — it is about censoring debate. An amicus brief from fifty Jewish scholars explains that Jewish students are already protected under existing state and federal law, but AB 715 goes further by treating classroom discussions of Zionism, Israel, and Palestinian history as presumptively harmful — chilling instruction through vague standards and complaint-driven investigations that invite enforcement against protected speech. Two other amicus briefs, filed by a number of Jewish groups including Jewish Voice for Peace, oppose the law on the grounds it unfairly assumes all Jews associate themselves with Israel and Zionism.  And the Institute for the Understanding of Anti-Palestinian racism explains that AB 715 harms Palestinian, Arab and Muslim students by “codif[ying] the pre-existing patterns of anti-Palestinian racism by establishing a system of structural exclusion endorsed by the State of California. By centering antisemitism as the singular urgent concern and remaining silent about anti-Palestinian, anti-Arab, and anti-Muslim discrimination, the statute builds a hierarchy of whose identity deserves safety.”

Misrepresentations and Flawed Arguments in Defense Amici Briefs

Defense amici — including JPAC, the Bay Area Jewish Coalition, and the American Jewish Committee — mischaracterize plaintiffs’ claims and falsely assert that the teachers challenging AB 715 “argue that it is appropriate to use their classrooms to spread their personal political views even if they are antisemitic.”

ADC’s reply sharply rejects this mischaracterization.

ADC also filed an opposition to defense amici’s request for oral argument, warning that amici are attempting to take up limited hearing time to repeat Defendants’ talking points and distort Plaintiffs’ positions, so that only one side of the story is heard. ADC urged the Court to deny the request to prevent confusion and prejudice at a time-limited injunction hearing.

“JPAC’s amicus brief intentionally misrepresents our arguments and the law,” Younes said. “We do not argue that teachers are entitled to engage in activism or antisemitic speech or conduct in the classroom. We argue that AB 715 suppresses legitimate classroom instruction on historical facts and prevents teachers from doing their jobs.”

The defense amici, as well as government defendants, attempt to downplay teachers’ constitutional rights, portraying educators as having virtually no First Amendment protection when teaching contested political issues. ADC counters that courts have long held the state may not impose a “pall of orthodoxy” on classroom discussion.

The defense further seeks to rebrand a viewpoint-based regime as neutral anti-discrimination law, even as they celebrate AB 715’s new investigative powers, anonymous complaint channels, and penalties — all tied to an antisemitism framework that explicitly conflates anti-Zionism with antisemitism. The amici also rely on contested incident statistics, including ADL data that classify anti-Zionist speech as antisemitic by definition.

In addition, the defense amicus briefs conflate genuine antisemitic harassment with political pedagogy, repeatedly pointing to classroom materials and pro-Palestinian expression as appropriate enforcement targets. This confirms that AB 715 is designed not merely to stop slurs or threats — already prohibited under existing law — but to silence one side of a political debate.

Finally, the amici ignore the vagueness concerns central to First Amendment jurisprudence, failing to address the dangers of a speech-regulating statute that leaves teachers guessing where lawful criticism ends and punishable “antisemitism” begins.

“The precedent Mr. Emhoff and the government seek is dangerous,” Younes said. “It would reduce teachers to parrots of government-approved talking points—especially on Israel and Palestine. That is not what the Constitution allows.”

ADC Urges Court to Halt Enforcement

ADC and co-counsel ask the Court to enjoin enforcement while the case proceeds.

“California already has powerful tools to address genuine antisemitic harassment,” Younes said. “What AB 715  does is convert criticism of Israel and Zionism in the classroom into a punishable offense under antidiscrimination law. The Constitution does not permit that, and anyone who believes classrooms cannot be turned into fora for government propaganda should oppose AB 715.”