FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
October 10, 2025
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BLM Grassroots – California Calls Out the Censoring of Teachers and Students Under the Guise of Stopping Anti-Semitism
Black Lives Matter – California and each of the state’s eight chapters condemn the passage by the state legislature and signing into law by Governor Gavin Newsom of the unconstitutional and undemocratic bill AB 715 and its weak companion legislation, SB 48.
Dubbed by the Santa Barbara Independent as “California’s MAGA in disguise,” AB 715 creates a so-called civil rights office, appoints an “Anti-Semitism Coordinator,” and allows anonymous complaints against students and teachers who speak out in opposition to the genocide in Gaza or the brutal Israeli regime.
AB 715 is unconstitutional, muzzles California teachers, jeopardizes student activists, stands to disproportionately target Muslim and Black educators, and sets up Jewish students for resentment on campuses as it gives them a level of protection no other group enjoys. It will cost cash-strapped California millions in legal fees, as it will certainly be challenged in court.
Governor Gavin Newsom’s shameless hypocrisy is front and center as he has called for defunding universities that give in to Trump’s pledge of fealty to conservatism, while imposing his own authoritarian muzzle on the state’s educators and young scholars. While the Governor cosplays progressive values with his Twitter fingers, he is forcing California schools to fall in line with a Zionist agenda by pushing a fake civil rights law that equates criticism of Israel with anti-Semitism, thereby silencing academic discourse and protected free speech.
With his wife of 28 years and partner in all things, Deanna Joseph, he founded the Florida chapter of Black Lives Matter Grassroots and serves as the founding Rapid Response Coordinator and on-the-ground lead for the worldwide organization.
We also know that the San Diego killers did not act in isolation, but in the context of a city, county, and country that has long criminalized people of color through so-called gang documentation and enhancements, white nativism, ICE raids, police violence, and racism and xenophobia writ large.
Charleston, SC – Black Lives Matter Grassroots stands in full solidarity with the Charleston Reparations Taskforce and the Gullah Geechee community in demanding the immediate transfer of over 7,000 acres of plantation land, including Middleton Place, Boone Hall, and Magnolia Plantation, to permanent Gullah Geechee stewardship.
