{"id":741,"date":"2026-05-22T14:09:22","date_gmt":"2026-05-22T14:09:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/jacksonvillemovingnews.com\/?p=741"},"modified":"2026-05-22T14:09:22","modified_gmt":"2026-05-22T14:09:22","slug":"florida-biologist-fired-over-charlie-kirk-post-after-his-death-wins-485k-settlement","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jacksonvillemovingnews.com\/?p=741","title":{"rendered":"Florida biologist fired over Charlie Kirk post after his death wins $485K settlement"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

Florida officials will pay nearly half a million dollars to a biologist who was fired by a state agency for criticizing conservative activist Charlie Kirk on social media after his death.<\/p>\n

Read more Sports<\/a><\/p>\n

The state\u2019s Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission fired biologist Brittney Brown in September after she reposted a meme on her personal Instagram account that claimed Kirk wouldn\u2019t care about children being shot in their classrooms. She filed a lawsuit seeking reinstatement, saying she struggled to find other work because the state agency is the regulatory body for her research specialization in bird conservation.<\/p>\n

Brown on Thursday signed a $485,000 settlement agreement with agency directors that covers backpay, damages and attorney costs. She agreed as part of the deal to not seek future employment at the agency.<\/p>\n

Fish and Wildlife officials did not immediately respond to a request for comment.<\/p>\n

Brown was among a wave of workers in both the public and private sector who lost their jobs over comments about Kirk\u2019s assassination on a Utah university campus. Lawsuits are pending over many of those firings.<\/p>\n

Before his death, Kirk and the organization he founded, Turning Point USA, galvanized the conservative youth vote to help President Donald Trump win a second term.<\/p>\n

Kirk\u2019s supporters combed social media after the Sept. 10 shooting for posts they viewed as celebrating his death. Influencers like Laura Loomer pledged to ruin the careers of people who made light of the killing, and the conservative social media account Libs of TikTok shared the identities and workplaces of many who posted with its audience of millions.<\/p>\n

Libs of TikTok posted about Brown, and she was fired the next day, according to her lawsuit. Brown said someone then alerted Libs of TikTok about her termination only about 10 minutes after it happened and before it was made public.<\/p>\n

Read more Advisory issued for bacteria in water at Crandon Park North in Key Biscayne, FDOH says<\/a><\/p>\n

In a rare instance in Tennessee, a retired police officer was jailed for 37 days over a Facebook post joking about Kirk\u2019s assassination. Tennessee officials agreed Wednesday to pay $835,000 to settle a lawsuit filed by the man, Larry Bushart. While behind bars, Bushart lost his postretirement job and missed the birth of his granddaughter before authorities eventually dropped a felony charge against him, he said in the lawsuit.<\/p>\n

Before her termination, Brown worked for Florida\u2019s Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission for about seven years and studied shorebirds and seabirds on the panhandle, according to court documents.<\/p>\n

Carrie McNamara, an attorney with the ACLU of Florida, called Brown\u2019s settlement deal \u201ca hard-won vindication\u201d that sends a message to Florida officials that they cannot punish speech they dislike.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe First Amendment does not disappear when someone accepts a government job,\u201d McNamara said.<\/p>\n

Brown\u2019s former supervisor at the agency, Habitat and Species Conservation Director Melissa Tucker, had claimed that Brown\u2019s post generated hundreds of formal complaints and caused significant disruption. Discovery in the case later revealed that the agency only received about 50 complaints.<\/p>\n

U.S. District Judge Mark Walker imposed sanctions against Tucker last week for exaggerating the amount and then not correcting the record.<\/p>\n

Read more Sports<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Florida officials will pay nearly half a million dollars to a biologist who was fired by a state agency for criticizing conservative activist Charlie Kirk on\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":740,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[21],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-741","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-florida"],"yoast_head":"\nFlorida biologist fired over Charlie Kirk post after his death wins $485K settlement - Jacksonville Moving News<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/jacksonvillemovingnews.com\/?p=741\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Florida biologist fired over Charlie Kirk post after his death wins $485K settlement - 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