The Asbury Park Board of Education (APBE) in New Jersey last year appointed former strip club manager Robert DiSanto as school board president, prompting recent opposition from the group Concerned Women for America (CWA).
DiSanto managed a local club for four and a half years, according to a press release from the CWA that raises questions about his appointment.
"Apparently the APBE doesn't find it problematic for students to be able to see the president of their school board appearing in sexually provocative photos {on the Website}," the CWA says in the release. "Sadly, in a culture that has reduced sex to a spectator sport, this doesn't come as a surprise."
The CWA goes on to report that when concerned citizens in the community, including a teacher and a member of the local parent-teacher organization, expressed concern, the board refused to allow the complaints to be read at the school board meeting. A bylaw of the APBE gives the president authority to stifle speech that is "personally directed."
"This is another example of a porn advocate using the First Amendment as a sword and shield," said Jan LaRue, Concerned Women for America's chief counsel. "Worse yet, what kind of message does it send to school kids about pornography and morality to have an exhibitionist preside over the school board?"
The CWA said that "in response to this egregious violation of free speech rights," Dennis Caufield, an attorney allied with the Alliance Defense Fund, filed a complaint in the U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey on June 9. The complaint cites the APBE's violations of the First and 14th Amendments to the Constitution, as well as violations of New Jersey state law. He also filed a motion for a preliminary injunction against the APBE, to prevent the Board from adhering to its anti-free-speech bylaws.
