Stanford University claims it has made no final decision over use of Trump image after law professor produces emails she argues show ‘censorship’

Stanford University is risking a major battle over censorship after blocking a law school professor from using an image of Donald Trump on a flyer promoting a conference on sexual assault, claiming it could be “seen as partisan”.

Michele Landis Dauber, a law professor at the prestigious California university, who has been outspoken about campus sexual assault, planned to use a screen grab from the infamous leaked video of Trump on Access Hollywood bragging about groping women and saying the phrase “grab them by the pussy”.

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She argues that a decision by an associate dean at the law school to prohibit her from using the image constitutes censorship and an intrusion on her academic freedom. “It feels like a real threat to academic freedom and speech,” Dauber said by phone on Friday. “This is not partisan. This is simply a photo of the president of the United States.”

The poster was drafted for an upcoming conference about Title IX, the federal anti-discrimination law that protects victims of sexual violence and faces an uncertain future under Trump.

The associate dean, however, said in emails to Dauber that using the photo could be “seen as partisan” and refused to allow her to print the flyer or include the image on an event website, according to emails provided to the Guardian.

Stanford did not initially respond to requests for comment. The university’s vice-president for communications, Lisa Lapin, later emailed the Guardian insisting that Dauber had “not been barred” from using the image and demanding a retraction of the article.

However, Lapin amended her position after the Guardian pointed to emails showing an associate dean at Stanford had for months prevented Dauber from using the image, citing university policy. Lapin then conceded that the law school “did not believe that the photo was appropriate”.

“When this photo was used recently, the law school asked Professor Dauber not to use it,” she said. “She objected and the law school offered to get an opinion from university leadership.” She added: “The university has in fact not made any final decision in this matter.”

Dauber confirmed she was recently offered an opportunity to refer the long-running dispute to Stanford’s counsel, but said she was also told there would be no guarantee of a response before her event in two weeks.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest The flyer for the conference on sexual assault that used an image of Trump taken from the infamous Access Hollywood tape. Photograph: Courtesy of ​Michele Landis Dauber

The flyer for the two-day conference in May, co-chaired by Dauber, did not include any commentary on the photo, which features Trump with the TV host Billy Bush and the actor Arianne Zucker. Trump and Bush were caught commenting on Zucker’s looks in the 2005 video, with Trump saying: “I’ve gotta use some Tic Tacs, just in case I start kissing her. You know I’m automatically attracted to beautiful. I just start kissing them ... I don’t even wait.”

The footage and Trump’s “locker room talk” defense became a major issue in his 2016 presidential race against Hillary Clinton and sparked an international debate about sexual violence and misogyny. The Washington Post reporter David Fahrenthold published the video in one of many stories on Trump that earned him a Pulitzer prize this week.

“This poster isn’t advocacy. It’s just a picture of a news event,” said Dauber, who made headlines last year for her recall campaign against the judge who gave a light sentence to the Stanford athlete Brock Turner, convicted of sexually assaulting an unconscious woman on campus.

Emails show that for months, university communications officials have been refusing her requests to include certain images in the advertising materials for the forthcoming event.

Dauber said Stanford refused to allow her to use the Access Hollywood image on the event website and that when she instead suggested a photo from the Women’s March – the high-profile demonstration earlier this year - university officials also claimed it could be seen as partisan.

Because it is a not-for-profit organization, university policies prevent people from engaging in political activities on behalf of Stanford, such as supporting candidates for office or electioneering. Dauber said the university eventually allowed the Women’s March image for the website, but did not allow the Trump photo due to concerns over perceived partisanship.

When Dauber attempted to use the photo on flyers that would be printed on campus, the university again said it violated policy. Dauber said the university even objected when she offered to pay for and distribute the flyers herself, and remove Stanford’s logos.

The university is listed as a sponsor for the event, but Dauber said she personally raised most of the funding for the conference through donations from sources outside Stanford, which she said bolstered her case that the university was censoring her and infringing on her academic freedom.

In one email explaining the ban on the photo, Sabrina Johnson, associate dean for communications and public relations at Stanford law school (SLS), wrote: “We have been clear since January that these Access Hollywood images could give the appearance of partisanship and since the event is an SLS-sponsored event, they shouldn’t be used in the marketing of the event. This is per University policy.”

Johnson did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

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The conference, called The Way Forward: Title IX Advocacy in the Trump Era, aims to bring together activists, scholars and lawyers and is scheduled to include a former civil rights official under Barack Obama’s administration.

“Within broad outlines, speech that is challenging, speech that is critical, speech that gets students thinking about issues – that lies at the very heart and soul of academic freedom,” Dauber added in an email. “That is the opposite of what is happening here, which is that the university is very explicitly placating power and is censoring faculty speech to do it.”

Dauber said she wanted to use the image because it “raises a lot of questions about sexual harassment and sexual assault and the way it’s treated in society”.

Stanford has faced a string of scandals related to sexual assault in recent years. In addition to the Turner case, the university faced widespread backlash last year when it banned liquor from campus parties, a policy criticized as a tone-deaf and dangerous response to sexual assault concerns.

The university also received national scrutiny for its decision to cut ties with an attorney who represented students in sexual assault complaints after she criticized the university’s internal processes. Critics have also accused the university of ignoring complaints about serial predators and failing to support victims who come forward.

The university has vigorously denied those claims and has argued that its Title IX process is compassionate to victims and fair.

Restricting the Trump photo, Dauber argued, was another example of Stanford’s insensitivity when it comes to sexual violence. “It shows that there is still a lot of work for Stanford to do in the area of sexual assault and sexual harassment.”