There was a time in America when high school parking lots would see rifles racked in trucks.
What do you think? Should dealers start offering this again? pic.twitter.com/Gokxi68Nrt
— Tactical-reviews.com®️ (@Tactical_review) March 3, 2020
These days, of course, you can’t have a weapon on campus.
And sometimes, that includes the Improvised Explosive Device known as the promotion of Donald J. Trump.
As reported by Fox11 Los Angeles, a teenaged student in Florida has filed a lawsuit over the loss of his parking pass.
Why did his truck get the boot?
Despite Democratic insistence of government staying out of such things, the school punished him for what he put in the bed.
Tyler Maxwell had received an unusual gift from his grandfather: a large statue of an elephant colored in red, white and blue.
Painted on the effigy: “TRUMP.”
The 18-year-old told KTTV he was just enthused over his newfound right:
“I’ve been pretty excited for the last four years to be able to vote.”
Unfortunately, the Volusia County school didn’t share his glee.
Oh, #Florida! High school student drives pickup to school with ginormous red-white-and-blue elephant in the truck bed with @realDonaldTrump's name painted on it. School revokes parking pass. Student now has atty & is suing. https://t.co/rOJmaX3BMw
— Craig Pittman (@craigtimes) October 23, 2020
From Fox:
Monday, September 14, Tyler proudly drove to school with the decorated elephant in the back of his truck and parked it in the student parking lot. He said 20 minutes into his first class he was pulled out to have a talk with the principal.
“I was told to I had to go ahead and take it off campus,” Tyler said.
Following that, Tyler’s dad asked the school — in person — for a reason in writing why junior couldn’t park his elephant trunk trump truck in the lot.
When that wasn’t provided, the boy returned Tuesday, again with the elephant in the room.
The kid recalls what happened next:
“Tuesday morning, my parking pass was taken away.”
And now, Goldwater Institute attorney Jacob Heubert is involved.
The lawyer lays it out:
“It’s a freedom of speech case. The question is should a student have to give up his free speech right when he drives onto school property. The answer to that is No, and the school just needs to realize that.”
The school’s released a statement claiming the elephant could be seen as an official endorsement:
“The school board has obligation to provide politically neutral campuses…We allow political expression by students in the form of a T-shirt or a bumpersticker. But large signage is a different situation. A passerby could interpret a large sign in a school parking lot to be an endorsement by the school district…We don’t allow our parking lots to be used for political statements.”
A suit decrying First Amendment violation has been filed in federal court.
While a verdict awaits, Tyler’s switched to distance learning.
But he may not want to depend on that for a reprieve — as I covered in September, a politically-minded pupil was ejection-threatened in California for virtually displaying a Trump sign…hanging in his own bedroom.
Hopefully, Tyler doesn’t live with elephants.
Meanwhile, 2020 is a zoo.
-ALEX
See more pieces from me:
Kid Gets Told He’s Tossed From Class Unless He Hides His Trump Flag – in a Most Peculiar Place
Triumphant Return? Beto’s Back, and His New Domain May Surprise You
Find all my RedState work here.
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