������ýapp�ٷ�

The University of Texas at Dallas has a troubling history of trying to silence students. Now those students are fighting back.

Today, the editors of The Retrograde published their , marking a triumphant return for journalism on campus in the face of administrative efforts to quash student press.

Why call the newspaper The Retrograde? Because it’s replacing the former student newspaper, The Mercury, which ran into trouble when it  the pro-Palestinian encampments on campus and shed light on UT Dallas’s use of state troopers (the same force that broke up UT Austin’s encampment just one week prior) and other efforts to quash even peaceful protest. As student journalists , their relationship with the administration subsequently deteriorated. University officials demoted the newspaper’s advisor and even removed copies of the paper from newsstands. At the center of this interference were Lydia Lum, director of student media, and Jenni Huffenberger, senior director of marketing and student media, whose titles reflect the university’s resistance to editorial freedom.

The conflict between the paper and the administration came to a head when Lum called for a meeting of the Student Media Oversight Board, a university body which has the power to remove student leaders, accusing The Mercury’s editor-in-chief, Gregorio Olivares Gutierrez, of violating student media bylaws by having another form of employment, exceeding printing costs, and “bypassing advisor involvement.” Yet rather than follow those same bylaws, which offer detailed instructions for removing a student editor, Lum told board members from other student media outlets not to attend the meeting. A short-handed board then voted to oust Gutierrez. Adding insult to injury, Huffenberger unilaterally denied Gutierrez’s appeal, again ignoring the bylaws, which require the full board to consider any termination appeals.

The student journalists of The Retrograde have shown incredible spirit. With your help, we can ensure their efforts — and the rights of all student journalists — are respected.

In response, The Mercury’s staff went on , demanding Gutierrez’s reinstatement. To help in that effort, FIREand the Student Press Law Center joined forces to pen a Nov. 12, 2024 letter calling for UT Dallas to honor the rights of the student journalists. We also asked them to pay the students the money they earned for the time they worked prior to the strike.

UT Dallas refused to listen. Instead of embracing freedom of the press, the administration doubled down on censorship, ignoring both the students’ and our calls for justice.

In our letter, we argued that the university’s firing of Gutierrez was in retaliation for The Mercury’s unflattering coverage of the way administrators had handled the encampments. This is not even the first time UT Dallas has chosen censorship as the “best solution;” look no further than in late 2023 when they removed the “Spirit Rocks” students used to express themselves. Unfortunately, the university ignored both the students’ exhortations and ������ýapp�ٷ�’s demands, leaving UT Dallas without its newspaper. 

But ������ýapp�ٷ�’s Student Press Freedom Initiative is here to make sure censorship never gets the last word.

FIRE established , a fully independent newspaper. Without university resources, they have had to  and source their own equipment, working spaces, a new website, and everything else necessary to provide quality student-led journalism to the UT Dallas community. They succeeded, and FIREis proud to support their efforts, placing a  in this week’s inaugural issue of The Retrograde.

The fight for press freedom at UT Dallas is far from over — but we need your help to make a difference.

Demand accountability from UT Dallas. The student journalists of The Retrograde have shown incredible spirit. With your help, we can ensure their efforts — and the rights of all student journalists — are respected.