High Court Won’t Hear Appeal of Teacher Fired Over ‘Political’ Social Media Posts

The Supreme Court on Monday declined to hear arguments in a case involving a teacher who claims she was fired over social media posts expressing her views on transgenderism, immigration, and other controversial issues.  

Justice Clarence Thomas called the case “the latest in a trend of lower court decisions that have misapplied our First Amendment precedents in cases involving controversial political speech.” 

Massachusetts teacher Kari MacRae “liked, shared, posted, or reposted” six memes on TikTok expressing some of her views on hot-button social issues before she was an employee of Hanover Public Schools, according to Thomas.  

After she was fired, MacRae sued the school district for violating her First Amendment rights.  

One of MacRae’s posts is a meme featuring a photo of Rachel Levine, Biden administration assistant secretary for health in the Department of Health and Human Services, which read, “’I’m an expert on mental health and food disorders …’ says the obese man who thinks he’s a woman.” 

Another post read, “I feel bad for parents nowadays. You have to be able to explain the birds & the bees … The bees & the bees … The birds & the birds … The birds that used to be bees … The bees that used to be birds … The birds that look like bees … Plus bees that look like birds, but still got a stinger!!!” 

MacRae also posted a meme commenting on the state of U.S. immigration.

“Retirement plan: Move to Mexico, give up citizenship, come back illegally, set for life,” the post read.  

In cases involving the First Amendment rights of a public employee, Thomas Jipping, a senior legal fellow at The Heritage Foundation, says the “Supreme Court has established a balancing test” to weigh what could be construed as competing interest. A teacher maintains his or her First Amendment rights, according to previous court rulings, but the court might agree to limit a teacher’s speech, for example, in the interest of protecting or preserving a student’s safety.  

The Supreme Court “did not agree to hear this case because the fired teacher argued only that this test does not apply at all, a risky argument that would require the court to overrule previous decisions,” Jipping explained.  

“The outcome might have been different had she argued that the lower court did not apply the test properly in her case,” he added.  

MacRae was fired in 2021 after only teaching at Hanover High School for a month. When the school district became aware of some of her social media posts, the district concluded “that to ‘continue [her] employment in light of [her] social media posts would have a significant negative impact on student learning’ at Hanover High, defendants terminated MacRae’s employment,” according to a ruling from the U.S. 1st Circuit Court of Appeals.  

No justice dissented from the court’s decision declining to hear the case, but Thomas did respond to the case in a seven-page statement expressing his “serious concerns about the First Circuit’s approach” to the case. 

“Our precedents establish that the First Amendment protects a public employee’s right, in certain circumstances, to speak as a citizen addressing matters of public concern,’” Thomas wrote, citing a previous case.  

“The First Circuit concluded that, on balance, the risk of disruption outweighed MacRae’s interest,” Thomas continued, adding that the lower court’s analysis strikes him as “deeply flawed.” 

“I do not see how the First Circuit could discount the First Amendment value of MacRae’s comparatively mild posts, all of which reflected positions that represent by no means an isolated segment of public opinion,” Thomas said, again citing a number of former cases. 

Judicial Watch, a conservative legal group, represented MacRae and expressed disappointment over the court’s denial of its petition to hear the case.  

“The Supreme Court’s decision not to take up her case is a missed opportunity to uphold the First Amendment,” Tom Fitton, president of Judicial Watch, said in a statement Monday.  

Since being fired, MacRae has twice run unsuccessfully for the Massachusetts state Senate, losing a general election race in 2022 and narrowly losing the Republican primary in 2024. She is running again in 2026. 

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