Kansas Attorney General Kris Kobach, joined by 17 other states, filed a friend-of-the-court brief with the U.S. Supreme Court to defend students’ First Amendment free speech rights.

The case centers on a Massachusetts middle school student who wore a shirt reading, “There are only two genders.” School officials instructed the student not to wear it. In response, the student modified the shirt, covering “two” so it read, “There are only (censored) genders,” but this version was also prohibited.

“The right to free speech does not disappear inside a school building. The First Amendment protects this student’s right to speak, even when that speech is disfavored by woke school administrators,” Kobach said.

The attorneys general urge the Supreme Court to review the case after a lower court upheld the school’s actions. Citing the 1969 Tinker decision, the brief emphasizes that “a student may express his mind ‘if he does so without materially and substantially interfering with the requirements of appropriate discipline in the operation of the school and without colliding with the rights of others.’”

South Carolina and West Virginia co-led the brief, joined by the attorneys general from Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Ohio, Texas, Utah, and Virginia.

The brief can be found here.