The University of Washington maintains that it did nothing wrong, saying that it decided to settle as a matter of cost and practicality.
A computer science at the University of Washington has reached a settlement with school, ending a years-long free-speech lawsuit over a parodied syllabus.
According to KOMO News, Professor Stuart Reges filed his lawsuit after he was disciplined for parodying a university-approved “land acknowledgement” in a 2022 course syllabus.
Land acknowledgments are often used by universities and other public institutions to recognize that Native Americans are the original owners of the lands on which many such facilities sit.
Reges, in 2022, created a parody of the university’s land acknowledgement statement for his Computer Programing II syllabus. Instead of using the official, university-approved version, Reges wrote, “I acknowledge that by the labor theory of property the Coast Salish people can claim historical ownership of almost none of the land currently occupied by the University of Washington.”
The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE), which represented Reges in his lawsuit, said that the professor was unfairly punished for exercising his First Amendment right to engage in protected speech.
“UW was not amused,” FIRE said. “University officials censored Reges’ parody statement from his syllabus and created a competing class, so students could choose not take a computer science class from Reges. The university also initiated a nearly year-long investigation of Reges under an ‘antiharassment policy.’”
On Thursday, FIRE announced that Reges—who obtained a favorable ruling from the Ninth Circuit in December 2025—has finally resolved his lawsuit. Under the terms of the settlement agreement, the University of Washington can take no further action against him over the parodied land acknowledgment.
In a press release, Reges posited the agreement as a victory for free speech.
“I am deeply grateful to FIRE for this legal victory which will remind public universities that they are obligated to respect the First Amendment rights of their students, faculty, and staff,” Reges said in a statement released by FIRE.
“More importantly,” he continued, “I hope that my protest can help reverse a decade-long trend toward ideological conformity in academia and help convince them that, instead of ‘protecting’ students from controversial ideas, they should be helping them to learn how to cope with disagreement. Only then can we heal the deep divisions that confront us today.”
Gabe Walters, a FIRE attorney who represented Reges in the lawsuit, told FOX News that the professor knew his syllabus was likely to attract controversy.
“Professor Reges parodied UW’s land acknowledgment statement knowing doing so might cause offense, but his deeper purpose was to encourage his colleagues to see beyond their partisan perspectives and consider that others might disagree with them,” Walters said. “Epistemic humility is necessary to test ideas, and there’s no better place to put ideas to the test than our colleges and universities.”
Walters emphasized that FIRE’s decision to represent Reges was made more on principle rather than the organization’s explicit affinity for, or approval of, his viewpoints.
“Consider the flip side of the coin: a state that bans professors from putting indigenous land acknowledgment statements in their syllabi also is putting its thumb improperly on the scale of public debate, and as a non-partisan organization dedicated to the freedom of speech and academic freedom, FIRE also would represent the hypothetical professor who wants to include a sincere land acknowledgment on their syllabi but is prohibited from doing so—just as we’ve challenged Florida’s ‘Stop WOKE Act’ and Texas’s campus ban on drag performances,” Walters said.
The University of Washington, for its part, maintains that it did nothing wrong, saying that it decided to settle as a matter of cost and practicality.
“The University of Washington maintains that we acted appropriately, and this settlement is in no way an admission of any wrongdoing. Given the Ninth Circuit’s 2-1 decision overturning the federal district court’s decision in favor of the University, a settlement agreement was the most reasonable option due to the attorney fees and costs that would have resulted from the Ninth’s Circuit’s decision. Prof. Reges has retained his faculty position and continued teaching throughout this process, and his status with the UW remains unchanged,” a university spokesperson said in a statement.
Sources
U of Washington Pays Professor $600K, Allows ‘Parody Land Acknowledgment’
University pays professor $600K after being punished for parodying land acknowledgments
UW professor wins $600,000 settlement following free speech lawsuitUW
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