In a win for freedom of speech on campus, the state of Arizona has dropped all charges against Tim Tizon, a former Arizona State University student representing Young Americans for Liberty who was arrested and convicted for trespassing in March 2022 while distributing copies of the U.S. Constitution to his peers on the school’s Tempe campus.
The Liberty Justice Center filed an appeal on his behalf in January.
As Jacob Huebert, president of the Liberty Justice Center, aptly stated, “What could be more obviously constitutional than handing out copies of the Constitution?” However, it is also a reminder of the troubling persistence of speech and assembly restrictions at universities such as ASU.
JP Kirby, director of student rights at YAL, noted, “ASU officials showed how much more the school values its own bureaucratic processes than the freedom of its students.” Tizon’s story should spur ASU and other institutions of higher learning to reevaluate their policies to better protect the rights of all students to speak on campus.