Law School Recommends Against Bar Admission for Student Over Alleged Celebration in Law School Clinic

From Judge Brantley Starr (N.D. Tex.) May 12 in Fisher v. Campbell:

This case arises from a Texas Tech University law student who allegedly uttered celebratory remarks inside the clinic program offices after news of Charlie Kirk’s assassination while she was employed at the school’s legal clinic. The university reprimanded her and reported her to the state bar for unprofessional conduct, contending that she had violated the school’s honor code by failing to uphold professional or fiduciary duties connected to clinical programs.

The alleged celebratory remarks were described as:

“I’m in such a good mood.”

“That guy got shot.”

“I’m in the best mood ever.”

“They got him.”

“This is wonderful.”

The student, Fisher, denied making those statements, and the Honor Council report initially appeared ambivalent. But the Dean concluded that Fisher had indeed made such statements; an excerpt from his letter to the bar reads:

The Dean’s Office recommends against Ms. Ellen Fisher’s admission to the Bar.

We do so for three related reasons. First, Ms. Fisher, as a clinical student with a supervised practice card, disrupted our clinical spaces with celebrations of a political assassination. Second, she has refused to take responsibility or show any remorse for her unprofessional actions. And, third, she has demonstrated dishonesty when discussing this incident during our Honor Code proceedings.

The matter proceeded with substantial detail. On September 10, 2025, Ms. Fisher celebrated a political assassination in the Law School’s clinical suite during work hours. This occurred while she was a clinical student with a supervised practice card, thereby authorized to represent clients under supervision in the clinics. The celebration was loud, overheard by others, and it disrupted the clinic’s operations.

Ms. Fisher’s conduct was unprofessional and also violated the Law School’s Honor Code, Section 2.H (Violation of Professional Duties), which prohibits failing to uphold professional obligations related to clinical programs. Plainly stated, we expect clinical law students working under supervision in our clinics to maintain the same professional standards that law firms expect from their attorneys in their offices. Publicly celebrating a political assassination within our clinical spaces is a reprehensible act that runs counter to widely recognized professional expectations in legal workplaces. Accordingly, the conduct was deemed a serious violation of the Honor Code.

The Dean’s Office states it has full confidence in its fact-finding that Fisher celebrated an assassination in the clinical suite in a disruptive manner on September 10, 2025. Notably, on September 16, Professor Metze’s administrative appointment as clinical director was terminated and his duties were adjusted with limited student contact precisely because of his admitted failure to take steps to correct Fisher’s celebration of a murder in his office. Professor Metze later retired from the law faculty at the end of 2025 amid further disciplinary proceedings supported by Texas Tech University and the Texas Tech University System for this same admitted failure to perform basic job responsibilities on September 10.

At no point, to the knowledge of the court, did Professor Metze retract his admission that Fisher celebrated a murder in his office on September 10, though he later claimed he could no longer recall the details of that day when the Honor Code investigation began. Professor Terri Morgeson continues to corroborate Professor Metze’s account, confirming Fisher’s misconduct.

The Honor Council majority found by clear and convincing evidence that Fisher celebrated a murder in the hallway of the clinical suite. The Council did not find by clear and convincing evidence that she celebrated the murder in Professor Metze’s office, although a majority seemed to agree that a celebration occurred in that office as well.

The Dean’s Office agrees with the Council’s finding on the disruptive hallway celebration but believes the Council erred in its conclusion regarding the disruptive office celebration. The Dean’s Office contends that the Council’s ruling on the office incident was incorrect primarily because it failed to follow a recommendation from the Dean’s Office about which witnesses should testify, thereby omitting crucial testimony. In this inquisitorial process, the Honor Council must call all relevant witnesses since there is no prosecuting attorney presenting a case for responsibility. The Dean’s Office continues to believe that Professor Metze’s admissions and Professor Morgeson’s corroboration establish that Fisher celebrated a murder not only in the clinical hallway but also in Metze’s clinical office.

Notably, Fisher has refused to accept responsibility for any misconduct or to express remorse. Instead, she has repeatedly responded with false statements in an effort to avoid accountability, denying that the disruptive conduct occurred in both the clinical hallway and the clinical office.

As the speakers in the discussion remind us, “often the cover-up is worse than the crime.” Had Fisher admitted fault and shown remorse rather than offering ongoing denials, we might be reporting a different outcome today on her admission to the Bar. It should be noted that Fisher has benefited from a degree of leniency from our Honor Council—both in its fact-finding and in its recommended sanction—which, in my view, she does not deserve given her dishonesty. Such leniency, in my opinion, only reinforces concerns about her character and fitness to practice law.

Fisher sought an injunction to prevent Dean Nowlin from issuing the reprimand and to annul all disciplinary action against her, but the court held that such a request is barred by state sovereign immunity:

“Sovereign immunity bars private suits against nonconsenting states in federal courts.” And state sovereign immunity also “precludes suits against state officials in their official capacities.”

That said, there are two primary exceptions. “First, Congress may expressly abrogate state sovereign immunity.” And second, Ex parte Young “permits suits for prospective relief against state officials acting in violation of federal law.” “Here, Congress has not abrogated Texas’s sovereign immunity, and the State has not consented to suit. Young is the whole ballgame.”

The Fifth Circuit has explained that “Ex parte Young created a narrow doorway through the sovereign immunity defense” and “[t]o turn the key on the Ex parte Young door, a plaintiff must sue the right defendants and ask for the right remedy.”

First, the right defendants. To be the right defendants under Ex parte Young, the individuals must be “officers of the state … clothed with some duty in regard to the enforcement of the laws of the state … who threaten and are about to commence proceedings, either of a civil or criminal nature.” In short, the defendant “must have some connection with the enforcement of the law being challenged.” … [T]he official must have “more than the general duty to see that the laws of the state are implemented”; it must be a “particular duty to enforce the statute in question”; the official must have “demonstrated willingness to exercise that duty”; and “the state official, through her conduct, compels or constrains persons to obey the challenged law.” Even so, plaintiffs “need only show a scintilla of enforcement by the relevant state official.” …

[T]he only defendants who have even a scintilla of enforcement authority to effectuate this relief are Dean Nowlin, who sent the reprimand to the Texas Board of Law Examiners; Dean Gonzales, who has appellate review of Honor Code violations; and the Board of Regents….

Second, the right remedy. Ex parte Young‘s narrow carveout permits courts to “command[ ] a state official to do nothing more than refrain from violating federal law.” So the doctrine is limited to “prospective relief to stop future harms.” It “does not permit judgments against state officers declaring that they violated federal law in the past.” Nor can it be used to attack or undo a state official’s past actions.

Accordingly, injunctions that are packaged as prospective relief but require “the voiding of a final state” official’s action are “quintessentially retrospective and thus out of bounds under Young.” …

Fisher … seeks two remedies: (1) an injunction annulling the defendants’ disciplinary action against her and (2) enjoining the defendants to inform the Texas Board of Law Examiners that any and all disciplinary outcomes against Fisher are officially retracted.

Like invalidating or voiding a state agency order, annulling defendants’ past disciplinary action against Fisher is “quintessentially retrospective.” Namely, to annul is to “declare or make legally invalid or void.” Thus an annulment can only reach what has been, not what will be. To conclude otherwise would impermissibly conflate retroactive and prospective relief. So her first remedy is “out of bounds under Young.“

Because the Court lacks jurisdiction to order Dean Nowlin, Dean Gonzales, and the Board of Regents to annul the past action, it cannot order them to tell the Texas Board of Law Examiners that they have done so. Such would be a lie. That too is barred by Ex parte Young. {The Texas Board of Law Examiners is owed the truth. And our dues. But maybe not sovereign immunity anymore under Galette v. New Jersey Transit Co., 607 U.S. — (2026).}

In sum, Ex parte Young‘s narrow doorway is locked to Fisher as to these requests.

Fisher argues that her injunction is warranted to return this case to “the last uncontested status of parties.” For example, in Doe v. Texas Christian University, the learned Judge O’Connor issued a temporary restraining order against TCU that ended a suspension.

Suspensions and reprimands are different, as are Title IX and the First Amendment. Doe centered on a Title IX claim, and Congress abrogated the States’ Eleventh Amendment immunity for purposes of Title IX. Section 1983 does not do to the states what Title IX does. Besides, suspending a student is a continuing course of conduct. And the courts under Ex parte Young can enjoin the future action of continuing a suspension. But there is no future action with a reprimand.

Likewise, Shah v. University of Texas Southwestern Medical School—which Fisher does not cite—is inapplicable. In Shah, a medical student was dismissed, sued UT Southwestern alleging his dismissal was unlawful, and sought preliminary injunctive relief because Shah feared UT Southwestern would disclose Shah’s disciplinary record to other medical schools he was applying to. On that record, Judge Fitzwater granted preliminary injunctive relief because there was an imminent threat that defendants would disseminate Shah’s disciplinary record to third parties and would notify the schools that he had been dismissed. The focus of the prospective issue was not on reputational harm to the plaintiff but on the conduct of the school.

But here, Dean Nowlin has already informed the Texas Board of Law Examiners and the State Bar of Texas about the reprimand. The defendants’ conduct has already occurred. There is no future or ongoing action by the defendants to enjoin.

Thus the Eleventh Amendment’s jurisdictional bar remains as to the relief Fisher seeks in this motion.

Nevertheless, circumstances could change. It is possible the Defendants might take future actions (such as suspending Fisher or preventing her graduation) that Fisher might regard as unlawful. Some of those actions could fall within—not against—Ex parte Young. But no such request is before the Court. Nor is there any indication that those harms are imminent. For that reason, the Court lacks jurisdiction over this motion and cannot proceed at all on the requested injunctive relief….

This does not mean that Fisher has no case. Under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, she may still pursue monetary damages against the individual defendants. {And this remains a separate basis for why the Court will not issue injunctive relief to preserve the last uncontested status quo. As Judge O’Connor has explained, injunctive relief is necessary to prevent irreparable injury so as to preserve the court’s ability to render a meaningful decision on the merits. Even if more money is likely to cause more problems, money remains a meaningful remedy that precludes the need for injunctive relief here.}

“Federal courts are courts of limited jurisdiction.” They are not places of universal justice. Accordingly, the Court may act only where authorized by the Constitution or a statute. Here, the Eleventh Amendment bars the requested relief, so the Court DENIES the motion for a temporary restraining order and a preliminary injunction.

I don’t have strong views on the Eleventh Amendment question. Yet I am deeply troubled by how the law school acted in this matter.

Even if one concedes that the student engaged in disruptive and unprofessional speech, one should consider how expansive a standard this creates for law schools. Nothing in that standard confines itself to celebrating assassinations or endorsing violence; a broad swath of speech on controversial topics—race, sex, religion, sexual orientation, gender identity, abortion, affirmative action, and more—could be deemed disruptive or unprofessional by some. It is easy to imagine students, faculty, and deans labeling, for example, the celebration of a court ruling or an election outcome as racist or anti-trans, Islamophobic, or otherwise problematic under that rubric. In my view, that standard is not compatible with the First Amendment rights of students at public universities.

Perhaps a clinic should wield some authority to remove students (effectively firing them as employees) for disruptive or unprofessional speech within its offices, just as law firms typically have some such power. I am unsure how far that authority should extend, since even that power can be misused and poses significant risks within an institution primarily devoted to education rather than a private firm. But even granting such power, it does not justify denying the right to practice law—a qualification that would bar her from working in any law firm, regardless of the firm’s ideology.

Finally, I acknowledge that one of the three reasons given for the recommendation was the Dean’s perception of dishonesty during the investigation. Yet the report makes clear that this was only one of several reasons; and the emphasis on the other grounds indicates that she likely would not have been treated in that way in any other context had she not spoken about the Kirk killing.