Yes, really. State schools are public institutions. Their employees are public employees. As public institutions, they are not legally permitted to enact policy that infringes 1A rights. A private school could have more leeway on this—subject to employment law, union contracts, etc—but a public school is very limited. A public professor could be censured for expressing testimony that, for example, reveals that they are likely to treat students in a biased way. If they testify with something like “Racial minorities and women aren't qualified to have a right to vote,” that impugns their ostensible fair treatment of their students and fellow faculty, and that is actionable. But testifying about how a state's voting policies disenfranchise legitimate portions of its population? Not at all actionable. Testifying that election integrity demands that certain practices be established even though practically speaking it could result in disenfranchisement of certain minorities? Also not actionable.
We'll have to see how the lawsuit pans out, but I doubt you're right here. Public institutions are in no way obligated to let their members serve as expert witnesses in their capacity as an employee. See Garcetti v. Ceballos.
However nothing is stopping them from testifying against the institution in their capacity as a private citizen. This is why whistleblowing is possible.
UF is saying they cannot be expert witnesses affiliated with the university per their process explicitly outlined in the article.
It would be another thing if they were trying to testify in another capacity and UF was trying to stop them.
An expert witness acts as a servant of the court, not as the agent of their employer. Naming the UoF as your employer is simply stating the truth to the court about your credentials; it doesn't mean the UoF has to take responsibility for your testimony.
I agree, but the entire point of the article is that UoF has had an agreement in place with all employees saying that they must get approval in order to serve as an expert witness to begin with.
> I agree, but the entire point of the article is that UoF has had an agreement in place with all employees saying that they must get approval in order to serve as an expert witness to begin with.
Government institutions are limited in how they can restrict the speech of their employees because of the first amendment. This is a safety net to prevent the government from consolidating power by putting their thumb on the scale of public discourse.
IANAL (nor an expert!), but I would have expected that an expert witness appears in court in response to a summons; he is therefore obeying the orders of the court, which I would have expected would override any shifty terms in an employment agreement.
