Campbell Law School removed Charlie Kirk flyers. A student claims discrimination
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Student posted Charlie Kirk flyers saying "End Political Violence"; school removed them.
- Student alleges viewpoint discrimination and contacted FIRE, which pressed Campbell.
- Campbell reviews flyer policy while student must disclose the disciplinary hearing.
Last semester, a day after the assassination of Charlie Kirk, a Campbell University Law School student hung images of Kirk and his family around Raleigh campus buildings. The flyers displayed the message, “End Political Violence.”
The school promptly took the posters down — and sent the law student a disciplinary warning.
The student, Justin Booker, said taking his flyers down while leaving others up in the same areas amounts to viewpoint discrimination in violation of his rights to free expression.
Originally, the assistant dean of student life, Regina Chavis, told Booker the school didn’t allow the posting of personal messages, he said. But Booker couldn’t find this provision in the school’s student handbook, he said.
“I filed a formal complaint with the administration about this, because not only is this a free speech issue, it actually risks the law school’s accreditation,” Booker, 24, told The N&O. He contends Campbell violated its own free speech policy and that of the American Bar Association, or ABA.
“It says that explicitly in ABA standards that they have to follow the First Amendment jurisprudence. So the fact that they’re not doing that, and they have explicitly refused to do that, actually is crazy.”
But the administration doesn’t agree with him.
Booker appealed the removal of his flyers and his disciplinary warning to the faculty committee on student life. They didn’t see it Booker’s way. Neither did the dean of the law school, J. Rich Leonard. He agreed with the committee, affirming the removal of the posters.
That’s when Booker contacted the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, or FIRE. Now, the free-speech organization is pressuring Campbell to clarify its speech policies by a deadline of March 17.
According to Campbell’s handbook, flyers are only allowed on certain bulletin boards, and further, university leadership has the right to remove any student publication for any reason. It’s this second provision that has FIRE fired up.
Free speech issue?
“It’s particularly noteworthy that other political content was allowed to stay posted, as was other commercial content,” said FIRE program officer Dominic Coletti, who wrote the letter to Campbell. “It’s really hard to come up with a policy based explanation for this, other than they did not like the image of Charlie Kirk. That is the most likely explanation here and they haven’t given us another.”
Booker said letters notifying students about Black History Month and celebrating figures from Black and Hispanic civil rights movements are allowed to stay up, while his was taken down. The FIRE letter asks Campbell to consider whether it would’ve sanctioned the removal of flyers about voting rights or vaccination.
“For law schools, part of their job is to teach the First Amendment and the free speech rights that we as a country imbue our citizens,” Coletti continued. “There’s some irony to the university punishing that same kind of free expression.”
Booker says that liberal students at Campbell are “very outspoken and very vocal” about taking the “large cohort of conservatives ... down a notch.” He said he believes the administration at Campbell is reacting to these voices. Booker is active in conservative groups on campus, like the Republican National Lawyers Association.
In response to this situation, Campbell says it is reviewing its flyer policies. As it stands now, though, Booker is still banned from putting up his flyer.
“Campbell University has received a letter from FIRE, inquiring about the response to flyers posted by a student within the Campbell Law building,” the school said in a statement to The N&O. “The letter asked for an institutional response by next week. Campbell University is currently reviewing the letter, the internal complaint and the Campbell Law student organizational communication and promotion policy. We plan to respond to FIRE after examining all relevant information.”
Because Booker was the subject of a disciplinary warning on this issue, he’ll have to disclose that on every bar application he ever submits.
“All I really want from this is for the people who did the wrong thing to admit they did wrong, promise they won’t do it again to me or anyone else, and apologize,” Booker said. “Instead, I have been brushed off, ignored, disrespected, and censored. No due process, no transparency, and no one actually willing to address my concerns.
“I truly believe that Campbell Law School is in a unique place to create some of the best lawyers in the country, but it will not do so if the administration continues to shut down conservative voices and punish the free expression of its students.”
This story was originally published March 11, 2026 at 5:00 AM.
CORRECTION: A previous version of this article misspelled Dominic Coletti’s last name.
