The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) and co-counsel filed a motion to intervene in a federal lawsuit on behalf of five Knox County, Tennessee, taxpayers who oppose a religious public charter school’s demand to use public funds to teach “explicitly biblical and Christian education.”
In November 2025, the Wilberforce Academy of Knoxville filed a lawsuit seeking to compel the Knox County Board of Education to use taxpayer money to fund its religious public charter school. The proposed intervenors, who include public school parents, faith leaders and community leaders, are seeking to join the suit on the side of the defendants because they oppose the school’s proposed use of public money to fund religious education that would violate both Tennessee and federal law as well as the fundamental principle of separation of church and state.
Charter schools are a part of Knox County’s public education system and cannot advance religious doctrine. Like all public schools, they must accept and serve all students and cannot be run as religious schools.
The intervenors are asking the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Tennessee to allow them to participate in the case to safeguard the right of all public-school students to a secular and equitable education.
