SAN ANTONIO – Former Alamo Trust president and CEO Kate Rogers alleges her First Amendment rights were violated in a wrongful termination lawsuit filed Monday against state and Alamo Trust leaders.
The lawsuit names the following defendants:
Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick
Commissioner of the Texas General Land Office Dawn Buckingham (Buckingham’s agency oversees the Alamo)
Alamo Trust, Inc.
Remember the Alamo Foundation
Welcome Wilson, Jr., chair of the Alamo Trust Board of Directors
Among her requests in the lawsuit, Rogers is asking to be reinstated as president and CEO of the Alamo Trust and to be paid damages.
Indigenous Peoples Day post
On Oct. 13, the Alamo’s X accounts made a post in honor of Indigenous Peoples Day.
“Today, we honor Indigenous Peoples and their communities, recognizing their history at the Alamo,” the post said. “Opening in 2027, the Alamo Visitor Center and Museum will feature an Indigenous Peoples Gallery, celebrating the bands, clans and tribes that shaped the region. #IndigenousPeoplesDay.”
After the post, Buckingham’s Chief of Staff, Adrian Piloto, called the Alamo Trust’s communications director “to complain about the post,” the lawsuit says. The communications director then posted a second statement recognizing Columbus Day, and Piloto allowed both posts to stay up.
According to the lawsuit, the next day, Buckingham said on X, “I did NOT authorize this post. This is frankly unacceptable and it has been deleted. Woke has no place at the Alamo.”
On Oct. 15, the lawsuit says Buckingham sent a publicly posted letter to the Alamo Trust Board, asserting the post was “misaligned with the culture of The Alamo … This blatant disregard of the battle-centric focus of The Alamo, that most Texans expect – the liberty or death history, must be addressed immediately.”
In an Oct. 15 board meeting, the board allegedly told Rogers, “The state is too upset about this. Someone is going to have to pay.”
According to the lawsuit, Rogers offered to resign. The board told her they “would not even consider it.”
The board then voted to terminate the communications director, the lawsuit said.
Dissertation statements
The lawsuit says Rogers’ Alamo Trust leadership ended “abruptly” after Patrick read a copy of her 2023 dissertation, where she “expressed her personal views about the role of the Alamo in bringing people together.”
The lawsuit emphasizes that Rogers wrote the dissertation in support of her doctorate of education. Rogers also made similar statements posted online in 2022 and 2023, “and no one had ever expressed any concerts about them.”
According to the lawsuit, her dissertation made “two personal statements.”
“Philosophically, I do not believe it is the role of politicians to determine what professional educators can or should teach in the classroom,” Rogers wrote. “Instead, teachers should be afforded the autonomy to make those decisions based on their own expertise as well as the needs of their students.”
In the second statement, Rogers described how her role “positioned her between state political leaders,” noting that San Antonio officials “do not agree with the state’s emphasis on the Battle as the main focus of the future Visitor Center and Museum.”
“Personally, I would love to see the Alamo become a beacon for historical reconciliation and be a place that brings people together versus tearing them apart, but politically that may not be possible at this time,” Rogers wrote.
On Oct. 22, Patrick allegedly called Rogers and told her he found her dissertation.
“I need you to resign. You need to resign,” Patrick allegedly said to Rogers. The lawsuit says he also told her to make a public statement that her dissertation “had become a distraction.”
Rogers declined to resign. She later spoke to two Alamo Trust senior staffers and Andrade that evening, who “pledged her support to Rogers,” the lawsuit says.
But on Oct. 23, Andrade called Rogers and told her that Patrick insisted she be terminated. When asked what would happen if she didn’t resign, Andrade allegedly responded, “Then we will fire you,” and said Wilson agreed with the ultimatum, the lawsuit alleges.
“Rogers was terminated for one reason, and one reason only,” the lawsuit alleges. “Lieutenant Governor Patrick and Commissioner Buckingham did not like Rogers’s speech in her personal dissertation.”
After Rogers spoke publicly with Texas Monthly about her termination, the lawsuit alleges “the Alamo Trust and the Remember the Alamo Foundation retaliated against her by revoking their severance offer.”
The termination happened as the Alamo site is under construction on a visitor center and new museum as part of a $550 million redevelopment plan. The museum is expected to be completed in 2027.
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