The Queer Empowerment Council, or QEC, the student organization that hosts and organizes Draggieland, has filed a federal lawsuit against the nine members of the Board of Regents alongside its student regent, Chancellor John Sharp and Texas A&M President Mark A. Welsh III. The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, or FIRE, is representing the group.
The lawsuit comes days after the Board of Regents banned on-campus drag shows across the 11 universities in the A&M System, including the flagship campus in College Station. The resolution, passed unanimously by the regents last Friday, said drag shows were “inconsistent with the system’s mission and core values of its universities, including the value of respect for others.”
“We refuse to let Texas A&M dictate which voices belong on campus,” a QEC statement reads. “Drag is self-expression, drag is discovery, drag is empowerment, and no amount of censorship will silence us.”
FIRE is a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization that defends free speech nationwide. The group is currently representing a student group that is suing the A&M System and West Texas A&M President Walter Wendler after they weren’t allowed to hold a drag show on campus in 2023.
In the 27-page lawsuit, FIRE asks a court in the Southern District of Texas to halt enforcement of the drag ban, claiming it violates the First Amendment. Draggieland was originally scheduled to be held in Rudder Theatre on March 27 before the regents forced its cancellation. On Friday, QEC president and material sciences graduate student Sophia Ahmed told The Battalion that Draggieland had sold over 150 tickets before the ban. The group began distributing refunds on Monday.
“Public universities can’t shut down student expression simply because the administration doesn’t like the ‘ideology’ or finds the expression ‘demeaning,’” FIRE attorney Adam Steinbaugh said in the statement. “That’s true not only of drag performances, but also religion, COVID, race, politics, and countless other topics where campus officials are too often eager to silence dissent.”
The FIRE statement calls the regents’ ban illegal and claims it constitutes “viewpoint discrimination,” noting that taxpayers fund the A&M System.
“If other students dislike or disagree with Draggieland, the solution is simple: don’t go,” FIRE attorney Jeff Zeman said in the statement. “Or they could organize a protest, as students opposing drag have in the past. The First Amendment protects drag and the ability to criticize drag — and it forbids the government silencing the side it disagrees with.”
To be considered harassment, the Supreme Court has established that speech must be “objectively offensive,” “severe” and “pervasive.” FIRE said a “once-a-year drag show in an enclosed theatre that requires a ticket to enter doesn’t even come close to satisfying those strict conditions.”
QEC has announced a “Day of Drag” protest for Thursday, March 6, and has asked students to dress in their “best drag outfits” across campus to prove that it “is not disruptive or inappropriate.” A separate protest supporting Draggieland is planned for the same day from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. in the Academic Plaza.
An A&M System spokesperson said the System could not comment on pending legal matters. A university spokesperson said the A&M System received notice of the lawsuit Wednesday afternoon, “and the Office of General Counsel is reviewing it now.”
