The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit on Thursday, Oct. 22, removed Senior U.S. District Judge Henry Wingate from a challenge to Mississippi's DEI law after an order in the case, drafted with help from generative AI, cited fabricated plaintiffs and invented statutory quotations, and its corrected replacement still cited a case that does not exist. A unanimous three-judge panel vacated Wingate's preliminary injunction against House Bill 1193 and directed that the case be reassigned to a different judge in the Southern District of Mississippi.
The case, Jackson Federation of Teachers v. Fitch, No. 25-60496, was filed in June 2025 by a group of teachers, professors, students, parents and organizations. HB 1193, enacted in April 2025, bars public schools, colleges and universities from requiring diversity training, maintaining certain DEI offices and endorsing specified DEI concepts. Schools adjudicated to have violated it twice, with the first violation left uncorrected after 30 days, lose state funding until they comply.
The AI problems trace to a temporary restraining order Wingate issued on July 20, 2025. That order named 11 non-parties as plaintiffs, listed two defendants no one had sued, relied on declarations from four people who are not in the record and attributed language to the statute that it does not contain.
Key facts
- 01The Fifth Circuit vacated the injunction against Mississippi's HB 1193 and took the case from Judge Henry Wingate on Oct. 22.
- 02Wingate's July 20, 2025 order named 11 non-party plaintiffs and cited declarations from four people not in the record.
- 03Wingate told Sen. Chuck Grassley a law clerk used Perplexity to help draft the order without vetting it.
- 04The corrected order still cited Cousins v. School Board of City of Norfolk, a 1974 case that does not exist.
- 05Mississippi can enforce HB 1193 while the case continues; the ruling does not decide the law's constitutionality.
Mississippi Attorney General Lynn Fitch's office flagged the errors two days later. Wingate replaced the order with a corrected version backdated to July 20 and described the problems as clerical. After an inquiry from Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley, Wingate acknowledged in October 2025 that a law clerk had used Perplexity to help draft the order without vetting its output.
The corrected order, which was folded into the statewide preliminary injunction Wingate issued in August 2025, still cited Cousins v. School Board of City of Norfolk, a 1974 Fourth Circuit decision that does not exist. The panel raised that citation during oral argument in New Orleans in September.
Judge Jerry Smith, writing for the panel, called reassignment on remand an extraordinary and rarely used power but found that both of the Fifth Circuit's tests for it were met. Smith wrote that the district judge ignored and manipulated governing law "apparently to satisfy a policy agenda," and faulted Wingate for never explaining why the fabricated material appeared in the original order or why the order was justified without it.
“The proceedings in the district court were a botch job, to say the least”— Jerry Smith, Fifth Circuit Judge
A footnote said the panel was "grateful, and, indeed, lucky" that the state had filed the original, since-withdrawn order as an exhibit, which preserved a record of what it contained. Judge Catharina Haynes wrote separately to stress that on remand, teachers must not be barred from teaching students not to discriminate under Title VII.
The ruling does not decide whether HB 1193 is constitutional, but lifting the injunction lets Mississippi enforce the law while the litigation continues. The opinion spent about 10 pages guiding the next judge, stating that the law does not apply directly to students and that teachers and students can still discuss race, sex and civil rights issues in various circumstances. The district court must also weigh the state's authority over publicly funded curricula and government speech against the speech rights of teachers and professors.
The fabricated material in this case appeared in a judicial order rather than a lawyer's filing, and the Fifth Circuit treated those errors as part of its assessment of whether Wingate should keep the case.
The plaintiffs argue that HB 1193 is vague, overbroad and violates the First Amendment, while the state argues it may regulate educational content in its public institutions. Robert McDuff of the Mississippi Center for Justice, who represents the plaintiffs, said the ruling addressed some of their concerns because it confirms that public school teachers and students can still discuss those issues. The plaintiffs can continue challenging other parts of the law and may seek rehearing by the full Fifth Circuit.
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