This past Friday (Nov. 9, 2018), the Texas Supreme Court denied Kountze ISD’s Motion for Reconsideration of the denial of the school district’s earlier Petition for Review in Kountze Indep. Sch. Dist. v. Matthews, 2017 WL 4319908 (Tex.App.—Beaumont 2017).  As you may recall, this is the case where the lower court held that the Kountze ISD cheerleaders had a First Amendment right to include religious Bible verses on the run-through banners that they held up for the Kountze High School football players to run through at the beginning of Kountze High School football games, because the court found that the run-through banners were the private speech of the individual cheerleaders, and not speech that anyone would attribute to the school.   I filed an amicus brief for the school district both when they sought to appeal to the Court (Kountze ISD Amicus Brief), and also when they sought reconsideration.  Kountze ISD Amicus Brief (rehearing)

The school district may choose to try to appeal the case to the United States Supreme Court — which, like the Texas Supreme Court, picks which cases it will hear — but this should effectively end this litigation in Texas.