Supreme Court Won't Hear Appeal on 'Let's Go Brandon' Shirt Ban
Justices leave in place lower court ruling that allowed a Michigan school to prohibit the anti-Biden slogan on student apparel.
The Supreme Court on Monday declined to hear an appeal from two students who were prohibited from wearing "Let's Go Brandon" sweatshirts at their Michigan middle school. The students argued the ban violated their First Amendment rights, but the high court's decision leaves in place a ruling by the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals, which found that the school could prohibit the sweatshirts because the slogan constituted vulgar speech.
The Sixth Circuit's October 2025 ruling determined that school administrators could reasonably interpret the "Let's Go Brandon" slogan as vulgar, aligning with speech that schools may prohibit. The appeals court affirmed that requiring students to remove clothing with the slogan did not violate the First and Fourteenth Amendments.
In the majority opinion, Judge John Nalbandian wrote, "In the schoolhouse, vulgarity trumps politics." However, Judge John Bush, in a dissenting opinion, expressed concern that allowing schools to censor political speech by reclassifying it as vulgarity could lead to the censorship of legitimate political disagreement, which he argued is forbidden by the First Amendment.
The case originated when the mother of two middle school boys sued the school district in 2023 after school staff asked her sons to remove the sweatshirts. The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE), representing the mother, argued that the school district infringed upon the students' First Amendment rights. According to the lawsuit, school officials deemed the slogan "equivalent to the f-word."
An attorney for Tri County Middle School stated that the ban was based on the message violating the school's dress code and not on its political content. The slogan "Let's Go Brandon" gained prominence in the fall of 2021 as a euphemism for "F— Joe Biden" after a NASCAR reporter misheard a crowd chant. FIRE has argued that schools should not be able to censor political speech, regardless of its form, stating that criticism of the president is core political speech protected by the First Amendment.