The 2021 law requires Florida’s public colleges and universities to conduct annual surveys on the topic of “intellectual freedom and diversity of viewpoints.” But contrary to Salon’s inaccurate original headline, the law does not require anyone to register their political views. Students and faculty members can decide whether to participate in the surveys, which are anonymous.
Salon Executive Editor Andrew O’Hehir said in an email Thursday that while another Salon editor defended the original headline in 2021, the publication recently took another look and concluded that the headline “conveys a misleading impression of what the law actually says of Florida, and did not meet our editorial standards.” Salon changed the headline from “DeSantis signs bill requiring Florida students and professors to register political views with state” to “DeSantis signs bill requiring survey of Florida students and professors on their political views’.
DeSantis spokeswoman Christina Pushau said in an email Thursday that her colleagues tried unsuccessfully to get Salon to change the title in 2021. She said, “It’s good to see that Salon has finally changed its bogus title after the pushback that received yesterday. It should have happened much earlier. Even better, Salon’s reporter and editors should have read the legislation before writing an article about it (good practice for journalism in general!).”
King said in a comment sent by a representative on Friday: “I regret publishing the headline without being more confident that the story is correct. Salon is usually more reliable. Twitter is a constant experience and I will try to do better.”
What the law says and what its critics say
DeSantis signed the law, known as HB 233, into law in June 2021. At the time, he argued that universities promote certain “orthodoxys” while shunning or suppressing other viewpoints. The law requires Florida’s public colleges and universities to annually conduct “objective, nonpartisan, and statistically valid” surveys created or selected by the state board of education. These surveys are required to assess “the extent to which competing ideas and perspectives are represented” at these institutions and the extent to which “members of the college community, including students, faculty, and staff, feel free to express their beliefs and perspectives about the campus and in the classroom.” The state board of education is required to publish the survey results each year. The law has been controversial from the start. Opponents described the surveys as encroaching on academic freedom and freedom of speech and association, argued that the surveys are intended to suppress political views with which Florida Republicans disagree, and have raised concerns that the results could be used by those Republicans to target institutions or professors for funding cuts or other punishment. Opponents also argue that 2022 entrance exams include inappropriate ‘leading’ questions.Judicial a case challenging the law goes to trial. And the United Faculty of Florida union urged “all faculty, staff and students in higher education” not to complete the surveys.
People are entitled to their subjective positions on the matter. But viral tweets this week highlighted a fact: that DeSantis signed a bill requiring students and faculty to register their political views with the state. And that’s just wrong.
Nothing in the law says that anyone is required to complete the surveys. The law also doesn’t specify that completing the surveys must be optional — but it really has been optional until now. The introduction to the 2022 surveys, which were sent out in April, made it clear that participation “is completely voluntary” and that respondents “are free not to answer any question or to withdraw from the survey at any time,” as the Tallahassee Democrat newspaper reported in April. Second, although the law does not specify that surveys must be anonymous, anonymity is also state policy. The introduction to the 2022 surveys states: “No personal information will be associated with your responses. This survey is anonymous, and responses will only be reported at the group level, not at the individual level.” (Opponents argue that faculty members, particularly members of minority demographics, can still be identified by their responses to survey questions .)
This article has been updated to add a comment from author Stephen King.
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