A clinical assistant professor at Texas A&M, a specialist in the opioid crisis, gives a lecture in which, in part, she places blame on the Lt. Governor of Texas, Daniel Patrick, for adopting policies that have made the crisis worse.   A student in the audience, whose mother is a Texas politician, tattles to Mom, who tells the Lt. Governor's office, which contacts A&M Chancellor John Sharp, who replies within a couple of hours that the professor "has been placed on administrative leave pending investigation re firing her. shud [sic] be finished by end of week.”

Put aside that Lt. Governor Patrick is a disgrace to civilization, the fact is that the First Amendment clearly and uncontroversially protects the faculty member's right to criticize his policies on the opioid crisis in the course of a lecture on that crisis, and that's before we even get to the distinctive academic freedom protection for her speech.

Coming in the wake of the dramatic weakening of tenure protections in Texas, the writing is on the wall:  elected officials in Texas now believe that university faculty can be disciplined for criticizing them.  If John Sharp isn't fired for his disgraceful misconduct, then all hope is lost.

(Thanks to Bennett Gilbert for the pointer.)