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Judge orders university to reinstate law student expelled for anti-Jewish hate comments

December 1, 2025 | | Print Article

Citing a landmark Supreme Court decision, a judge ordered a law student reinstated following his expulsion for comments about abolishing Jews “by any means necessary.”

Deemed a “controversial figure” at the University of Florida since he was initially enrolled at the Levin College of Law, Preston Damsky had been expelled earlier in the year after an investigation was opened into his statements on social media and within submitted works. Now, after he brought a suit in response to his removal for violations of the student code of conduct, U.S. District Judge Allen Winsor granted a preliminary injunction requiring him to be returned to normal standing at the school no later than Monday.

“The public-interest and balance-of-harms factors favor Damksy,” wrote Winsor in his ruling that raised the 2003 Supreme Court decision in Virginia v. Black on cross burning that argued against banning expression on the basis of it being “distasteful or discomforting.”

“The University, of course, has an interest in maintaining order, but it has no interest in violating the First Amendment to achieve that goal,” contended the judge as he argued the school did not demonstrate that the statements “constituted a true threat or was otherwise proscribable.”

Earlier in the year, Damsky posted on X: “My position on Jews is simple: whatever Harvard professor Noel Ignatiev meant by his call to ‘abolish the White race by any means necessary’ is what I think must be done with Jews. Jews must be abolished by any means necessary.”

He went on to reply to a since-deleted post reportedly made by a Jewish professor, according to Fox News, by writing, “Did Ignatiev want Whites murdered? If so, were his words as objectionable as mine? If Ignatiev sought genocide, then surely a genocide of all Whites would be an even greater outrage than a genocide of all Jews,  given the far greater number of Whites.”

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These posts, along with comments in papers written by Damsky, resulted in his expulsion in May following an investigation. By September, he filed suit, arguing a violation of his First Amendment rights.

In its defense, the school had alleged the student “created a material and substantial disruption to the academic operation of the UF College of Law,” including increased security resulting from safety concerns shared by other students.

Reacting to the judge’s ruling, Lake County Commissioner and attorney Anthony Sabatini took to X to express, “HUGE First Amendment win today on behalf of my client Preston Damsky against @UFLaw … Damsky was unlawfully punished in response to his political opinions, we sued & now a federal judge has ruled UF’s actions unconstitutional …”

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With a trial set for May, the school maintains the opportunity to appeal the injunction only effective after Damsky’s posting of a bond of $2,500.

Kevin Haggerty
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