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Ron DeSantis Memoir Suggested for School’s Reading Requirement

Gov. Ron DeSantis’ memoir was an option for students to fulfill their summer reading requirement at a Tallahassee, Florida high school.

Students at Lawton Chiles High School in Tallahassee, Florida, were suggested Gov. Ron DeSantis’ memoir to meet their summer reading requirements. On the school’s website, DeSantis memoir shows up under a list of suggested memoirs for students in AP Language and Composition. DeSantis’ The Courage to be Free was included along with When I Was Puerto Rican by Esmeralda Santiago and My Losing Season by Pat Conroy. Under the description, the school describes the book as “Governor recounts his upbringing as well as the policies that have guided his administration.” In the last year, DeSantis has led a charge to ban books that contain “pornographic and sexually explicit material,” signing a law “empowering parents” to report books in 2023, according to CNN. Florida banned 3,135 books between July and December 2023, according to advocacy group PEN America. The Daily Beast reached out to DeSantis and Lawton Chiles High School representatives but they have yet to respond.