Brad Brooks

LUBBOCK (Reuters) – Citizens who decry censorship filed a lawsuit against central Texas county officials. They claim they have violated their First Amendment rights and banned books from the library.

On Monday, Llano County officials were sued by plaintiffs. Despite having a wide range of political opinions, they believe the government can’t dictate what books they read.

According to PEN America, over 1,000 books, mostly addressing LGBTQ and racism, were removed from schools libraries across the country in the past few months. Texas is at the forefront of this trend with Texas’s Governor Greg Abbott and Texas State Legislature calling for schools to inspect their libraries for any books that are inappropriate or harmful for children.

Llano County lawsuit describes a heated debate that started last fall when people worked off the state’s list title to attack county officials and make removal requests.

January saw county commissioners vote to dissolve the library board. This was despite it resisting banning books. The lawsuit states that they “packed the new librarian board with political appointees”. After refusing to remove books from the shelves, one branch’s head librarian was dismissed in March.

Llano County Judge Ron Cunningham’s office, which is a defendant and top-ranking official in the county declined to comment. A request to comment was not received by the library board.

According to the lawsuit, the two books that were taken from Llano County’s library shelves by Isabel Wilkerson (Pulitzer Prize-winning author) are “Caste” and “They Called Themselves The K.K.K.Susan Campbell Bartoletti writes “The Birth of an American Terrorist Group”.

According to the suit, access to more than 17,000 digital books was also terminated by the county because it couldn’t individually restrict certain titles.