She fought Miami Gardens city hall — and won a major victory for free speech

Karen Hunter Jackson went to a Miami Gardens City Council meeting to speak her mind. Instead, the mayor ordered her microphone shut off and had her escorted from the chamber before she could finish speaking.

Eighteen months later, the city has agreed to pay her $92,500 to settle a federal lawsuit stemming from that confrontation, after a judge ruled that officials violated her First Amendment rights by silencing her criticism of an elected official.

The settlement, reached Oct. 13 and confirmed in an email exchange between attorneys for the opposing sides, followed a 29-page ruling that found Miami Gardens’ restrictions on public speech unconstitutional and held Mayor Rodney Harris personally liable for violating Jackson’s constitutional rights.

“We warned the City that what it was doing was not just wrong—it was unconstitutional,” said Faudlin Pierre, Jackson’s attorney. “Unfortunately, it took a federal judge to deliver that message loud enough for City Hall to hear.”

At the heart of the dispute was a seemingly simple question: Can a resident attending a public meeting criticize an elected official by name?

For Jackson, a community activist and former Miami Gardens City Council candidate, that question became a federal civil rights case after she tried to confront a councilwoman over remarks she considered insulting during the April 9, 2025, council meeting. Before she could finish, Harris cut off her microphone and police officers escorted her from the chamber.

U.S. District Judge Melissa Damian concluded that Jackson had done nothing to justify being silenced. She had spoken calmly, used no profanity or threats and had not disrupted the proceedings. The mayor’s decision to stop her, the judge found, violated constitutional protections that government officials were already obligated to respect.

The ruling, signed Oct. 9, also denied Harris qualified immunity, a legal protection that can shield government officials from personal liability in civil rights lawsuits.

The subsequent settlement resolves the litigation without requiring a trial on damages or the remaining issues. Under its terms, the city will pay Jackson $92,500, while all claims against the defendants, including Harris and Miami Gardens police Officer Richard Robinson, will be dismissed.

The City of Miami Gardens did not respond to a Miami Herald request for comment on the federal court ruling and the settlement, and on whether the city planned changes to its public-comment policy in light of the judge’s findings.

Dispute turns personal

The confrontation grew out of a political disagreement over a proposal to extend term limits for Miami Gardens council members.

At a March 26, 2025, council meeting, then-Councilwoman Katrina Wilson supported a proposed change that would allow council members to serve a third term. Jackson was among city residents who opposed the proposal.

According to Jackson’s lawsuit and facts discussed in the judge’s order, Wilson singled out Jackson by name during the meeting, referred to her as a “big girl” and accused her of engaging in “dirty politics.”

Pierre said the remarks were particularly troubling because Jackson had previously run for public office and believed the councilwoman was unfairly attacking her reputation.

The attorney said Jackson returned to City Hall two weeks later because she wanted to respond publicly to those accusations and ask the council to hold Wilson accountable.

“She was trying to address … the criticisms and attacks that Councilwoman Wilson had lodged against her,” Pierre told the Herald.

Jackson intended to call for a resolution censuring Wilson over her conduct. But when she approached the podium during the April 9 public-comment period, she encountered a rule that would become central to the federal lawsuit: Speakers were required to address the council as a whole rather than individual elected officials.

Jackson began by criticizing what she considered inconsistent enforcement of the city’s rules of decorum.

“The Council has applied our decorum ordinance inconsistently and arbitrarily,” she said, according to a transcript included in her amended complaint.

She then turned to Wilson’s conduct at the previous meeting.

“Councilwoman Wilson used her position not for dialogue, but for personal attacks,” Jackson said.

Harris interrupted, directing her to address her comments to him rather than to an individual council member.

Jackson continued criticizing Wilson.

“Councilwoman Wilson. If you cannot handle respectful criticisms, you should step down,” Jackson said.

The mayor again intervened.

“Stop her. Stop her,” Harris ordered, according to the complaint.

Robinson took control of Jackson’s microphone and disabled the audio. Officers escorted her from the chamber before her allotted two minutes had expired.

The incident was captured on video, which became part of the evidence in the federal case.

Jackson subsequently sued the city, Harris and several police officers, arguing that officials had punished her for exercising her right to criticize an elected representative.

Unconstitutional restrictions

In her ruling, Damian concluded that Miami Gardens’ public-participation policy violated the First Amendment both on its face and as applied to Jackson.

The policy prohibited speakers from directing remarks to individual council members and restricted comments considered personal or abusive.

The judge found that the rules gave city officials excessive discretion to decide which remarks were permissible and that they had been enforced inconsistently.

The distinction was particularly apparent in how the city treated speakers who mentioned elected officials by name.

Other residents had been allowed to identify council members during public comments without interruption, including speakers who praised elected officials. Jackson, by contrast, was stopped when she repeatedly identified Wilson while criticizing her conduct.

Harris acknowledged during a deposition that Jackson’s repeated use of Wilson’s name was the reason he interrupted her, had her microphone muted and ordered her removal.

Damian found that the mayor’s conduct violated Jackson’s clearly established constitutional rights.

The judge relied partly on a 2024 decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit involving Moms for Liberty and public-comment restrictions at Brevard County school board meetings. That ruling established limits on government officials’ authority to restrict criticism during public meetings.

Damian concluded that the precedent should have made clear to Harris that the First Amendment prohibited the selective suppression of protected speech.

As a result, the mayor was not entitled to qualified immunity.

The judge also found the city liable because Harris had final authority to enforce the public-participation policy during council meetings.

Damian did not resolve whether Robinson was personally liable for his role in removing Jackson. That issue involved a factual dispute over whether the officer knew the mayor’s order was based on protected speech or believed he was simply enforcing meeting rules.

The settlement eliminates the need to resolve that remaining question at trial.

Questions remain

Miami Gardens amended its public-participation policy in February 2026, after Jackson filed her lawsuit.

The revised rules removed the prohibition against directly addressing individual council members but retained restrictions on “abusive” speech and added language concerning “personally directed abusive” remarks.

The city argued that the changes rendered portions of Jackson’s lawsuit moot because the original restrictions were no longer in effect.

Damian rejected that argument.

The judge expressed concern about the subjective nature of the revised language, which could still give officials considerable discretion to decide what constituted abusive speech.

City representatives acknowledged during depositions that the term “abusive” could mean different things to different people.

The judge concluded that the revisions did not eliminate the constitutional controversy surrounding the city’s public-participation rules. The order did not separately invalidate every provision of the amended policy.

Pierre said the problem extends beyond Miami Gardens.

He said similar restrictions appear in public-comment rules used by municipalities and school boards throughout Florida, potentially allowing officials to silence residents who criticize them.

“A lot of these municipal ordinances, and school board included, towns, villages, cities, they will use the same language,” Pierre said.

He argued that rules prohibiting supposedly abusive or personally directed comments can become unconstitutional restrictions on speech when they allow government officials to decide which criticism they will tolerate.

Pierre said Miami Gardens’ revised policy still contains language he considers constitutionally problematic, although those provisions were not the subject of a separate final ruling in Jackson’s case.

City agrees to pay

The settlement reached Oct. 13 provides a financial resolution to Jackson’s lawsuit while bringing the remaining litigation to a close.

The agreement was confirmed in an email exchange that afternoon between Pierre and attorney Chris Stearns.

At 1:44 p.m., Pierre outlined five settlement provisions, including the city’s payment of $92,500 and the dismissal of all claims with prejudice, meaning they cannot be brought up in court again. Stearns responded at 2:15 p.m. with one word: “Confirmed.”

Under the agreement, Miami Gardens will pay Jackson $92,500 to resolve her claims against the city.

The agreement calls for Harris and Robinson to be dismissed from the lawsuit as soon as practical. The city will be dismissed after Jackson and the municipality execute a written settlement agreement.

Jackson also agreed to a limited release covering claims related to the March 26 and April 9, 2025, incidents, along with other First Amendment claims against Miami Gardens.

Notably, the agreement contains neither a confidentiality provision nor a non-disparagement provision, leaving Jackson and the defendants free to discuss the dispute and its outcome publicly.

Pierre said the city chose to settle after the judge had already determined that it and Harris were liable for violating Jackson’s rights.

“They settled out of court with us because they did not want to go to trial, because the court had already determined that they were liable,” Pierre said.

Wilson, whose comments helped trigger the confrontation, was not a defendant in the lawsuit. The judge’s findings of constitutional liability concerned the actions of Harris and the city.