A federal judge’s ruling has reset the legal fight over a drag show ban at West Texas A&M, handing the school a win after a full trial and wiping out a pending appeal.
The case had been on track for a closely watched hearing before the full 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals later this week. Instead, U.S. District Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk ruled Saturday that the university did not violate the First Amendment by blocking a 2023 drag show by the student group Spectrum WT.
Kacsmaryk, an Amarillo-based judge appointed by President Donald Trump, has drawn national attention for rulings favorable to Republican officials and conservative legal groups in abortion and LGBTQ rights cases.
The now-canceled appeal focused on whether Spectrum WT’s drag show should be allowed to proceed while the lawsuit was pending. Once Kacsmaryk issued a final ruling, the appeals court dismissed the appeal.
In his ruling, Kacsmaryk said Spectrum failed to show the planned drag show was intended to convey a specific message and said past performances that included stripteases and simulated sexual activity justified restricting the event in a campus venue open to minors.
He also ruled that Legacy Hall, where Spectrum planned to hold the drag show, is a limited public forum subject to reasonable, viewpoint-neutral limits because the university screens and approves events there.
Kacsmaryk leaned heavily on testimony from Spectrum’s president, who said the group was “not trying to convey a specific message” in a drag show planned for this year. He rejected Spectrum’s argument that selling tickets to benefit LGBTQ causes and suicide prevention made the performance itself expressive.
The judge also said minors had attended past Spectrum events and that performers had gone beyond what the group said it intended.
“Drag, by its ‘provocative,’ ‘transgressive’ nature, veers into sexualized content and Spectrum’s proven inability to control the content elides any argument that the 2026 show will be ‘appropriate,’” Kacsmaryk wrote.
Spectrum plans to appeal the ruling, said JT Morris, a supervising senior attorney at the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, which represents the student group.
Morris said the decision “reflects many of the same erroneous legal conclusions” the judge reached earlier in the case and conflicts with Supreme Court precedent on expressive conduct. He also pointed to another judge’s rejection of the Texas A&M University System’s separate attempt to ban drag shows based on officials’ views that the performances were offensive or demeaning.
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