Former Llano County librarian can move forward with lawsuit, federal judge rules

AUSTIN (KXAN) -- A former librarian for a Llano County library can now move forward with a lawsuit saying she was wrongfully terminated after she refused to remove books from library circulation due to their content, a federal judge ruled in lawsuit documents.

Suzette Baker worked for the Kingsland Library from 2016 until March 2022, the lawsuit said. She argued in the lawsuit that she was terminated for not removing books that county officials called "pornographic filth" or contained content on critical race theory (CRT), according to the lawsuit documents.

KXAN has reached out to Llano County for a comment. We will update this if one is received.

Baker filed the lawsuit in March to sue defendants identified as Llano County, the commissioner's court, the director of the Llano County library system and committee members who are part of a new library advisory board.

The removals of the books began in December 2021, after the Llano County Commissioners’ Court dissolved the library board and created a new advisory board.

Baker said the county was in a "frenzy" to remove books with titles that "either advocated for LGBTQ rights or racial justice."

After Baker was let go in March 2022 for not removing those books, she told KXAN's Nabil Remadna she was given a warning to remove books by her boss, but she did not comply.

“The books in my library in Kingsland were not taken off the shelves, we did not move them, I told my boss that was censorship,” Baker said back in 2022.

Baker also claimed her boss began "weeding" books from the circulation of the library. The lawsuit describes "weeding" as removing books that "have not been checked out in five years, are outdated, or are in poor condition."

By November 2021, Baker alleged a total of 17 books were "weeded" from the library circulation. By December, the library's e-book service was suspended due to two books that were pro-LGBTQ, and then the library was closed for three days so that books containing "pornographic content" could also be removed, according to the lawsuit.

County ordered to return moved books

In March 2023, Llano County was ordered by a federal court to return books removed from the library system.

The county was also ordered to update the library system's searchable catalog to show that the books were available for checkout.

Nabil Remadna, Cora Neas and Julianna Russ contributed to this report