Judge Recommends Dismissing State's Case Against Clay County Teacher Over Charlie Kirk Facebook Post

A state administrative law judge has recommended that Florida drop its case against Kelly Brock-Sanchez, a former Clay County elementary school teacher whom the Department of Education sought to strip of her teaching certificate over a Facebook post about Charlie Kirk's assassination. In an Oct. 21 recommended order, Division of Administrative Hearings Judge Suzanne Van Wyk found the department could not prove its central claim that the post was made on a "public" account, and recommended dismissal. The recommendation is not final: the state still decides what happens to her license.

What the judge found

Brock-Sanchez was an exceptional student education teacher at Ridgeview Elementary School in Orange Park. On Sept. 10, 2025, the day Kirk was shot and killed while speaking at Utah Valley University, she wrote on Facebook that his death was "a close second" to the obituary she and others had hoped to wake up to, according to the ruling as reported by the News Service of Florida and News4JAX.

The department's case rested on the claim that she posted on a "public" Facebook page "for all the world to see." Van Wyk rejected that. She found the account, under the name "Kelly SteelMagnolia," was private, with access controlled by the user. It showed her photo but not her school, and none of her roughly 300 Facebook friends were students, parents or coworkers, except one teacher she knew through the teachers' union.

The post spread only after one of those friends shared it more widely, and the judge said that choice was someone else's. She wrote that "the consequences of posting to a 'public' account cannot be attributed to her."

Van Wyk described the "public" allegation as a threshold allegation on which the department's other claims depended, including that the conduct was "grossly immoral," that it caused parents to question her qualifications and that the response required extra security that "cost the District money." With the threshold claim unproven, the judge found the department had not shown Brock-Sanchez violated the rules it cited.

The fallout at Ridgeview Elementary

The ruling recounts the reaction once the post went viral. Ridgeview's principal described the response as "overwhelming": more than 800 emails, 300 posts on the school's Facebook page, some of them threatening, and numerous calls and voicemails. Some teachers left school early after threatening messages and calls, and faculty and staff experienced "some fallout" the next day, according to the order as reported by News4JAX.

Florida Phoenix, which profiled Brock-Sanchez in July, reported that she was handed a letter placing her on administrative leave on Sept. 11, 2025, while attending a training session. Conservative activist Scott Presler shared her post with his more than 2 million followers, and the district received more than 500 complaints, the outlet reported.

How the state pursued her

The case grew out of a statewide crackdown announced by then-Education Commissioner Anastasios Kamoutsas. In a memo the day after the shooting, Kamoutsas wrote that some educators had posted "despicable" comments, said they did not represent Florida's teachers and vowed to investigate every educator who engaged in "this vile, sanctionable behavior."

On Sept. 22, 2025, Kamoutsas said he had found probable cause to seek permanent revocation of Brock-Sanchez's educator certificate, accusing her of gross immorality, reduced effectiveness in the classroom and failure to separate her personal views from those of a public institution, according to Florida Phoenix. Three days later, Clay County Superintendent David Broskie recommended her contract be terminated, and the termination took effect Oct. 2, 2025.

Kamoutsas left the department in July 2026 to become president of Polk State College. The State Board of Education appointed Henry Mack as commissioner on July 22.

Brock-Sanchez has also sued in federal court. Her lawsuit against the commissioner, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida in Jacksonville, argues her comment was constitutionally protected political speech. The state's lawyers have sought dismissal, and Florida Phoenix reported in July that the case is set for trial in November 2027. She is represented by an attorney with the Florida Education Association, the statewide teachers union. Since her firing, she told the outlet, she has been unable to find work in her profession.

A pattern in Kirk post cases

Brock-Sanchez's case is one of several Florida discipline cases over Kirk posts in which administrative law judges have sided with educators. The state opened about 50 investigations of Florida teachers over Kirk comments, according to Jacksonville Today, as cited by Florida Phoenix.

Judges have issued such recommendations in at least three cases this year, according to reporting by Florida Phoenix, Action News Jax and News4JAX:

In the McMath case, Judge Garnett Chisenhall recommended that the Education Practices Commission dismiss the charges, writing that "the Commission failed to carry its burden of presenting clear and convincing evidence," and found the post did not amount to gross immorality, Action News Jax reported. The commission had not taken final action as of that report.

The Kirk cases are separate from another recent state teacher discipline case covered by The Florida Press, in which a judge recommended a reprimand rather than a suspension for a Gainesville High School teacher targeted by state officials over a class superlative. That case did not involve Kirk.

What it means for Florida teachers

The Brock-Sanchez order turns on a narrow but significant point for the state's roughly 50 Kirk-related investigations: whether a post on a private social media account can be treated as public conduct when someone else spreads it. The judge's answer was that the department had to prove the post was public, and could not.

Administrative law judge findings of fact carry weight. Under Florida's Administrative Procedure Act, the agency issuing a final order can reject or modify a judge's conclusions of law, but it can reject findings of fact only if they were not based on competent, substantial evidence or the proceedings did not comply with the law. The department's case against Brock-Sanchez depended on a factual finding that the account was public, which Van Wyk found it had not proven.

What's next

The recommended order now goes to the state for final action. Recommendations from the Division of Administrative Hearings are not binding, and state agencies are not required to follow them. Penalties against an educator certificate in Florida are imposed by the Education Practices Commission, which will take up the case. The department has not publicly said how it will respond.

Even a dismissal would not return Brock-Sanchez to her classroom. Her Clay County contract was terminated more than a year ago, and her federal lawsuit continues separately.