At the end of March, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis signed into law House Bill 1557, also called the “Parental Rights in Education Bill.” Critics of the bill have referred to it as the “Don’t Say Gay” bill.
Controversy has surrounded the bill since its inception. President Biden referred to it as “hateful,” but supporters say the bill is limited in scope and has been misinterpreted.
Constitutional law experts Joshua Matz of Kaplan Hecker & Fink and Eugene Volokh of UCLA School of Law join host Jeffrey Rosen to discuss the debate over the bill and others like it.
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This episode was produced by Melody Rowell. Research was provided by Kevin Closs, Ruben Aguirre, Sam Desai, and Lana Ulrich.
Participants
Joshua Matz is a Partner at Kaplan Hecker & Fink LLP and an Adjunct Professor at Georgetown University. His practice includes complex commercial disputes, constitutional and civil rights law, and Supreme Court and appellate litigation. With Larry Tribe, Matz is the co-author of Uncertain Justice: The Roberts Court and the Constitution (2014) and To End a Presidency: The Power of Impeachment (2018).
Eugene Volokh is the Gary T. Schwartz Distinguished Professor of Law at UCLA Law School. He is the author of the textbooks The First Amendment and Related Statutes (6th ed. 2016), and Academic Legal Writing (5th ed. 2013), as well as over 90 law review articles. He is the founder and coauthor of The Volokh Conspiracy, a leading legal blog.
Jeffrey Rosen is the president and CEO of the National Constitution Center, a nonpartisan nonprofit organization devoted to educating the public about the U.S. Constitution. Rosen is also professor of law at The George Washington University Law School and a contributing editor of The Atlantic.
Additional Resources
- Full text of Florida House Bill 1557
- Complaint against Florida House Bill 1557 filed by Joshua Matz and team at Kaplan Hecker & Fink
- Eugene Volokh on The Dispatch podcast: “Understanding Florida's 'Don't Say Gay' Bill"
TRANSCRIPT
This transcript may not be in its final form, accuracy may vary, and it may be updated or revised in the future.
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