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Committee debates bill to extend campus free‑speech protections indoors; motion to advance fails

Senate Education Committee · March 1, 2021
AI-Generated Content: All content on this page was generated by AI to highlight key points from the meeting. For complete details and context, we recommend watching the full video. so we can fix them.

Summary

Lawmakers and witnesses debated Senate Bill 191, which would expand protections from the 2019 Forum Act to some indoor common areas and increase statutory protections for faculty and staff; the committee did not advance the bill after a 'motion to pass' failed for lack of a second.

Senate Bill 191, titled the Free Thought in Higher Education Act in testimony, drew lengthy testimony and questioning before the Senate Education Committee but did not win a committee vote.

Senator Dan Sullivan, who introduced the measure, said the bill builds on the 2019 Forum Act by expanding protected expressive activity to include certain indoor common areas and by clarifying that protections can extend to faculty and staff as well as students. "It just talks about the rights to free speech of members of campus communities," he said in opening remarks, and emphasized…

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