Book bans surged across the US in 2023. Florida was the blueprint.

The number of books banned in school districts across the U.S. reached a peak this year, a new report says, with Florida leading the way in more ways than one.

The state topped the country in the number of books banned alone, representing 40% of the country’s total cases, with over 1,400 books removed from libraries in the 2022-23 school year, according to a report issued on Thursday by PEN America, a free speech advocacy group. Across the country, over 3,000 books were removed.

But Florida’s influence also extends far beyond the number of books it has banned — the state’s conservative advocacy groups and legislation have helped pave the way for the rest of the country to follow suit.

“Florida is not an anomaly,” said Kasey Meehan, the lead author of the report, titled “The Mounting Pressure to Censor: The Drivers Behind Book Bans,” and the Freedom to Read Program Director at PEN America. “It’s almost like an incubator.”

Florida’s influence

One common theme emerged as researchers studied the success of book bans: The combined presence of conservative advocacy groups and state legislation.

Florida serves as an example of how those forces work together, as state laws allow for and respond to activist groups who challenge books on a local level. A school district’s proximity to a local chapter of such a group is associated with a greater number of bans, according to the report.

Its release comes days after the most recent effort by local chapters of one of the most prominent groups, Moms for Liberty, to recite explicit sections of books at school board meetings this week in Broward and Seminole counties with the goal of having them removed under a new state law, HB 1069. The law, in part, requires school boards to ban books from libraries if their language cannot be read aloud at a board meeting

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The group has close ties to Gov. Ron DeSantis, who signed the law in May. Earlier this month, he appointed one of the organization’s co-founders to the state Commission on Ethics.

Both Florida’s legislation and its advocacy surrounding books have served as an example for the rest of the country. Emerging in 2020 during the pandemic, Moms for Liberty now has close to 300 chapters in 44 states. Other states have used Florida’s legislation such as HB 1557, which went into effect in July 2022 and was dubbed by critics as the “Don’t Say Gay” bill, as a template, the report says.

“You can see the way in which similar tactics and strategies from groups in Florida are being applied in other states and other school districts,” Meehan said, “as well as the ways in which language and legislation are being copycatted.”

Books removed often discussed race, had minority or LGBT characters

The subject matter found within the banned books can be broken down into a few main themes: Violence and physical abuse in close to half of the books banned this year, topping the list, followed by books that discussed the health and wellbeing of students, and those that included sexual experiences between characters.

Close to a third of the banned books had characters who were minorities or discussed themes of race and racism, according to the report, like “The Bluest Eye” by Toni Morrison and “The Kite Runner” by Khaled Hosseini, both banned in Broward schools.

And nearly a third of the banned books had characters who were LGBT.

Groups like Moms for Liberty have argued that the removal of books from schools does not constitute a ban; rather, it places the power in the hands of parents.

“We’re not banning books, these books are not going to be banned from a parent deciding whether their child is going to read this or not,” Corie Pinero, the chair of the Broward chapter of Moms for Liberty, told the South Florida Sun Sentinel. “Most public libraries, these books are going to be available, and on Amazon, so if a parent decides their child is mature enough, they can go to the public library and check them out for free or purchase them.”

Oftentimes LGBT themes are considered pornographic, the PEN America report said, relying on “discriminatory tropes” that associate the community with sexuality.

Pinero argued that children should not read books with sexual content and included sexual orientation in that list.

“Children do not have the mental capacity and maturity to handle these contexts, rape, incest, homosexuality, heterosexuality,” she said. “So that’s really the issue we have.”

Book bans in South Florida

At least 1,406 book ban cases occurred in Florida during this school year, the report says, though the number of books no longer on shelves likely surpasses that.

South Florida has seen 43 cases during that time, according to PEN America’s index of book bans, with the greatest number in Palm Beach County at 23 books, followed by Broward with 12 and Miami-Dade with eight. Those numbers are far fewer than some districts, like Escambia in Florida’s Panhandle, which saw over 200. But they still reflect the influence of new state legislation that makes book challenges easier.

The numbers include books removed during the course of an ongoing investigation, which represent the majority of cases. Even though those books could return to the shelves, the process could take months or years, Meehan said, so PEN America counts those as bans.

The Florida Department of Education recently released its own data on book challenges, with lower numbers, counting 12 objections but only three removals in Broward, six objections and no removals in Palm Beach, and five objections and no removals in Miami-Dade.

‘Outsized influence’ of a few leads to book bans

Though the book ban movement appears widespread, it doesn’t necessarily reflect public opinion. Many of the bans can be traced back to one activist group, and in some cases, one or two people.

The report cites a Tampa Bay Times article from August which found that two people had brought about the challenging of hundreds of books across Florida; meanwhile, a Washington Post article said that 11 people were connected to 60% of over 1,000 challenges.

Surveys of the general public, meanwhile, have found that most Americans do not support book bans; a May poll found that 65% of Americans oppose book bans by school boards, 69% opposing bans by lawmakers.

A small group of people are having “an outsized influence in getting books off library shelves,” Meehan said, while state legislation like Florida’s “empowers that small group of local actors in getting those books removed.”

Pinero disagreed. Moms for Liberty has a chapter in almost every county in Florida, she said, and over 100,000 members, “and we started just over two years ago.”

She’s hoping the group will continue to expand. Already, several chapters have opened in California, she said, the state “actually one of our most active.”

The PEN America report found that states that lean Democrat have fewer bans, while Republican-leaning states have the majority, accounting for 88% of book removals. But even in more liberal districts like Broward, the proximity of local chapters of conservative advocacy groups and state legislation still leads to book removals.

“Whether you’re a Democrat or Republican district, you have nearly the same prevalence of some of the larger national groups that have chapters or local affiliates that have been driving for book bans,” Meehan said.

Contributing to the number of books taken off of shelves and placed under review is the vagueness of existing laws that Meehan says leads to confusion and overcompliance. School districts were told to “err on the side of caution” when it comes to removing books, she said.

Some districts removed books based on HB 1557, the so-called “Don’t Say Gay” law; now, court motions have revealed that the law was meant to cover classroom instruction, not libraries.

She thinks Florida’s school districts could respond to some of those challenges by asking the state for more explicit guidance about what books must be removed. It’s possible the state could decide to explicitly ban books based on HB 1557, but Meehan thinks officials wouldn’t want to.

“I don’t know if you want to be the state that’s prohibiting books in libraries,” she said. “That’s undemocratic, it’s quite authoritarian. So to already have these types of prohibitions on instruction being challenged, but to extend that to a school’s public library collection, is a bit dystopian.”

Just as the number of bans does not necessarily reflect public opinion, it also does not necessarily represent the extent of the censorship itself. There are places in Florida where entire classroom libraries have been emptied under the new legislation, Meehan said. There’s no way to count all of the books lost.

The PEN America report also does not account for the other ways in which new legislation and challenges have already begun to limit the diversity of books districts are purchasing now or in the future.

“There are many ways in which the censorship movement we’re watching is playing out,” Meehan said, “some of which we can count, some which is likely beyond our counting.”