The Supreme Court on Monday, October 5, declined to hear an appeal from two Michigan brothers who were made to remove "Let's Go Brandon" sweatshirts at their middle school. The order leaves in place a federal appeals court ruling for the school district in D.A. v. Tri County Area Schools.
The justices gave no reason, which is typical when the Court turns down a case. The denial was part of the first order list of the new term, according to SCOTUSblog.
How the case began
In 2022, the two brothers wore the sweatshirts to Tri County Middle School in Howard City, Michigan. School administrators made them take the sweatshirts off, SCOTUSblog reported.
The phrase spread in the fall of 2021 as a stand in for a profane chant aimed at President Joe Biden, after a television reporter misheard the chant during an interview with NASCAR driver Brandon Brown, the New York Post reported. The boys' mother sued the district in 2023 with help from the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, arguing that criticism of a president is core political speech.
The district's lawyer has said the shirts were barred under the dress code, not because of their political message. A federal judge dismissed the case.
A split appeals court
A divided panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit agreed with the district in October 2025. Judge John Nalbandian, joined by Judge Moore, reasoned that the phrase is a stand in for a vulgar word, so the message is vulgar even though the words on the shirt are not. "In the schoolhouse, vulgarity trumps politics," he wrote.
Judge John Bush dissented. He argued that the slogan is political criticism of a sitting president and that schools should have to show real disruption before banning it. "The liberty to criticize the president is not a freedom that stops at the schoolhouse door," he wrote, as quoted by the Sixth Circuit Appellate Blog.
Two precedents pulling in different directions
The dispute sits between two Supreme Court decisions. In Tinker v. Des Moines in 1969, the Court protected students who wore black armbands to protest the Vietnam War. It said students do not "shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gate," and that schools may restrict speech only if it would cause a "material and substantial disruption," as the Student Press Law Center summarizes it.
In Bethel School District v. Fraser in 1986, the Court ruled 7 to 2 that a Washington high school could discipline a student for a speech at an assembly full of sexual innuendo. The district acted "within its permissible authority in imposing sanctions upon Fraser in response to his offensively lewd and indecent speech," the Court held.
The brothers argued that the Sixth Circuit stretched Fraser too far and that the Third and Ninth Circuits read it more narrowly. The district answered that the ruling followed Fraser, and it warned against turning "nurseries of democracy" into "nurseries of debauchery."
What the denial means
The Supreme Court did not decide who was right. A denial of review sets no national rule, so the Sixth Circuit's approach governs schools in its region while other circuits may still treat coded political slogans differently.
The case is a reminder of how much turns on labels. If a court calls a message political, Tinker applies and the school carries a heavy burden. If the court calls it vulgar, Fraser applies and the school gets deference.
The First Amendment also surfaced this month in Donald Trump's petition over his dismissed Clinton lawsuit. It is the kind of case the Two Taps legal panel takes apart on the show.
Two Taps News stories summarize reporting and the analysis discussed on Two Taps and Friends. They are not legal advice. Read our standards.
