Travis Barham, senior counsel with Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), explains that Dr. Allan Josephson, a child psychiatrist, was hired in 2003 to run the university's then-struggling Division of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Psychology.
"He did a superb job turning the program around, giving it a national reputation," Barham relays. "He did such a good job that for three years in a row, he earned perfect marks on his annual evaluations."
But as AFN has previously reported, all that changed in the fall of 2017, when Dr. Josephson spoke at The Heritage Foundation, outlining his concerns about how gender dysphoria is often treated in children.
"As soon as he expressed his view … that we need to explore what's causing this confusion in children rather than rushing them into medical treatment, some university idealogues worked hand-in-hand with outside activist groups to end Dr. Josephson's career," the attorney details.
Dr. Josephson was soon demoted, harassed, and ultimately fired, effectively ending his career.
On March 28, 2019, ADF filed a federal lawsuit challenging the violation of the professor's free speech rights. The university fought the case all the way up to the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals before eventually settling.
"After a six-year legal battle, the university settled this case by paying him almost $1.6 million," Barham reports.
Though he says Dr. Josephson is "very happy that this is over" and that his rights have been vindicated through this settlement, the attorney says he never should have had to go through this process.
"Six years of litigation is an ordeal, even in the best of circumstances, even with the best of endings," he says.
Dr. Josephson is no longer at the University of Louisville, but now credited as one of the earliest prominent experts to challenge the popularity of transgender procedures for children, he continues to speak out on these issues and how to best treat some of the most vulnerable children.
ADF hopes this case will serve as a wake-up call to public universities that if they decide to violate the free speech rights of their faculty members, they can and will be held accountable.
