Judge Patricia Tolliver Giles, of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, granted a preliminary injunction on October 20 in the book censorship case E.K. and S.K. et al. v. Department of Defense Education Activity et al.

In the original complaint, filed on April 25, 12 students of military families attending five DoDEA schools brought First Amendment claims against the Department of Defense Education Activity, DoDEA director Beth Schiavano-Narvaez, and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth.

The plaintiffs in E.K. v. DoDEA include pre-kindergarteners through 11th graders at schools in Quantico, Va., Fort Campbell, Ky., Aviano, Italy, and two schools in Aomori, Japan. The students said that DoDEA removed school library books and curricular materials from shelves in response to three White House executive orders, violating their First Amendment right to receive information, and they demanded an injunction against the enforcement of the EOs, plus the return of the books and materials.

In her order, Judge Giles wrote that the defendants and their agents “are enjoined from further removals of educational books and curricular content,” and that they must “immediately restore the library books and curricular materials that have been removed since January 19, 2025 in implementation of the EOs to their preexisting shelves, classrooms, and units at Plaintiffs’ five schools.”

PEN America said that the decision was "a solid first step in a long road to restoring and protecting students’ freedom to read in schools run for military families," noting that U.S. representatives Jamie Raskin of New York and Chrissy Houlahan of Pennsylvania have proposed a Stop Censoring Military Families Act that would apply across all DoDEA schools.

Books under quarantine

Starting in February, DoDEA representatives began removing books in response to EOs 14168, an anti-transgender statement aimed at “defending women from gender ideology extremism”; 14185, on “restoring America’s fighting force” by eliminating “critical race theory,” “gender ideology,” and diversity, equity, and inclusion from workforce training; and 14190, which mandates “ending radical indoctrination in K–12 schooling.”

DoDEA instructed educators and staff to review school collections and remove “books potentially related to gender ideology or discriminatory equity ideology topics.” (The term “discriminatory equity ideology” parallels the acronym DEI, common shorthand for diversity, equity, and inclusion.) DoDEA informed parents and guardians that books had been relocated pending further evaluation, and on the court docket, an exhibit pictures a binder labeled “Quarantined Books” and dated February 2025.

Prior to filing their complaint, plaintiffs’ parents asked to see materials lists or filed Freedom of Information Act requests to learn what books had been “quarantined,” but they did not receive conclusive details.

In response to an order from Judge Giles, defendants submitted a list of 596 books and in her memorandum opinion wrote that “the evidence before this Court overwhelmingly suggests that the implementation of the book removal process has been inconsistent and opaque.” She further noted that “in the Defendants’ own words, the book removal process has been ‘iterative’ and ‘dynamic.’” For instance, an eighth-grade student plaintiff attested that she was unable to check out Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale, Alan Gratz’s Ground Zero, Lois Lowry’s The Giver, or George Orwell’s 1984, even though the titles did not appear on the provided list.

“In the broader scheme, it is troubling to the Court that Defendants continue to question Plaintiffs’ standing on the basis that they failed to identify specific books while persistently refusing to share that relevant information with them in the first place,” the judge wrote.

Judge Giles also was not sympathetic to the defendants’ contention that DoDEA school library collections constitute “government speech” and are not subject to First Amendment principles. She wrote that “the weight of the case law suggests otherwise” and found a government speech approach “unpersuasive.” Although Judge Giles acknowledged the Fifth Circuit’s plurality decision in Little v. Llano County, a public library case that validated the government speech argument and now appears headed to the Supreme Court, she characterized “public school libraries as places of academic freedom and intellectual pursuit” where students have the right to read.

The decision comes at a tense time when district court judges are pushing back against executive overreach, while conservative judges are testing government speech doctrine and questioning whether students indeed have First Amendment rights in school libraries. (According to the U.S. Constitution, they do.)

In E.K. v. DoDEA, the defendants further claimed that the plaintiffs wanted a “mandatory injunction” that would alter the status quo at the DoDEA schools. The court instead found that the plaintiffs sought a “prohibitory injunction” that was meant to restore the status quo, and proceeded with the case.

Alarming absences

In a recent report titled “Culture War by Executive Order,” EveryLibrary Institute referred to the DoDEA actions and reminded freedom to read advocates that EOs affect cultural institutions and broader educational programming alike. EveryLibrary noted that, responding to the EOs, the DoDEA “issued directives ending identity-based student clubs, canceling cultural heritage observances, and mandating the review and removal of school library materials deemed non-compliant with the administration's views on gender and race.”

The organization said the actions were “particularly alarming given their impact on military-connected youth who already experience instability and high mobility.”

The court filings and Judge Giles’s memorandum underscore these points. Following the removal of books and materials, two 11th grade student plaintiffs reported being unable to acquire content related to “gender and sex” for their Advanced Placement Psychology course. Other young plaintiffs noted that information on puberty and reproduction was scrubbed from the health curriculum.

Elementary student plaintiffs at two schools reported that DoDEA “cancelled all Black History Month programming and removed curricula and library displays about Black people,” barring one fourth-grade student plaintiff from presenting her report on Maya Angelou. Students discovered that their schools had canceled observances including Lunar New Year and Holocaust Remembrance Day, yet continued celebrating Valentine’s Day, St. Patrick’s Day, and Easter.

This story has been updated with additional information.