A San Gabriel Unified Faculty District instructor’s aide claims she was suspended with out pay after bringing a “Trump-themed” backpack and water bottle onto campus.
In a lawsuit filed final week in federal court docket, Alyssa Esquivel alleged that district officers violated her constitutional rights to free speech and state labor protections in disciplining her for carrying private objects that referenced the previous president.
She had been on paid depart for almost a yr till the district suspended her with out pay in April and despatched discover they supposed to fireplace her, in response to her grievance.
Supt. James Symonds, one of many defendants named in Esquivel’s go well with, declined to remark Friday night. However in objecting to Esquivel‘s bringing the objects on campus, officers cited a district coverage stating staff mustn’t put on “buttons or article[s] of clothes” that assist political candidates throughout educational time.
In her grievance, Esquivel, an American Signal Language educational aide who works with deaf college students, mentioned the problem started in June 2023, when one other aide moved Esquivel’s water bottle with Donald Trump and Ronald Reagan stickers, saying she “didn’t need Trump trying” at her.
Esquivel’s attorneys, from the Murrieta-based agency Advocates For Religion and Freedom, filed {a photograph} of the water bottle in court docket paperwork. One sticker exhibits a smiling Trump above the phrases, “Miss me but?”
The following day, Esquivel claimed, the identical aide flipped over a desk, yelling that Esquivel was attempting to “taunt” her by bringing the water bottle to highschool once more. This allegedly prompted a gathering with the principal, a instructor, Esquivel and two different aides wherein the principal affirmed that Esquivel may proceed bringing her water bottle to highschool, she claimed.
The opposite aides, nevertheless, allegedly refused to work with Esquivel — to the detriment of deaf college students who couldn’t comply with what was being taught, she claimed. She filed a proper discrimination declare with the district that month.
Then got here the backpack.
Esquivel wore a particular backpack with an American flag sample and the letters “TRUMP” throughout the entrance. It caught the discover of the principal, who advised her to not deliver the backpack or the water bottle to campus once more, Esquivel claimed. The principal additionally allegedly rebuked her for sporting “American flag-themed jewellery.”
At a gathering the subsequent day, ostensibly to debate whether or not Esquivel can be allowed to put on her backpack, the principal “detained” her for 3 hours whereas “intermittently prioritizing different affairs unrelated” to backpacks or water bottles, she claimed. In keeping with her grievance, the principal arrived at an answer: Esquivel may possess the backpack and water bottle on campus however not “show” them.
After Esquivel continued to hold the backpack and water bottle, a district official advised her she couldn’t put on “political apparel” on campus, the grievance says. Esquivel mentioned she coated up the final two letters on her backpack, which now learn “TRU,” and returned with it to highschool.
The district official threatened Esquivel with “fines and imprisonment,” banned her from campus and put her on paid depart, her grievance says. Esquivel claimed law enforcement officials escorted her off faculty grounds.
Over the subsequent yr, attorneys representing Esquivel and her employer traded letters arguing over whether or not both get together had violated district laws, California employment codes or federal legal guidelines governing protected speech. In April, the district’s board agreed to droop Esquivel with out pay and search to fireplace her, in response to her grievance.
Esquivel is searching for a proper listening to with district officers on whether or not she breached district insurance policies, damages, attorneys’ charges, an admission by the district that it infringed on her 1st Modification rights, and a everlasting injunction that might permit her to hold her backpack and water bottle on campus.
