6,870 Book Bans in Public Schools Last Year, According to PEN America

PEN America, a literature-focused group that supports free speech, released its list of most-banned books from school libraries in the 2024-2025 school year; the list shows a decrease in book bans from the previous year.

The Details: During the 2024-2025 school year, PEN counted 6,870 book bans nationally, which is down from the 10,046 it counted the previous year. It is higher than school years from 2021 to 2023, however, which averaged about 3,000 bans each year. The states with the highest rates of book banning were Florida, Texas, and Tennessee. The most frequently banned book across the nation was A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess.

For Context: PEN counts a book ban as “any action taken against a book based on its content and as a result of parent or community challenges, administrative decisions, or in response to direct or threatened action by governmental officials, that leads to a book being either completely removed from availability to students, or where access to a book is restricted or diminished.” It began conducting these reports in 2021.

How the Media Covered It: NPR (Lean Left bias) included a quote from the report calling book bans a “disturbing normalization of censorship” in public schools. The PEN report was rarely covered by the right, though Daily Mail (Right) focused on Stephen King being the most-banned author in U.S. schools and included commentary from the organization about why book bans are harmful. Tallahassee Democrat (Center) highlighted Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ claim that book bans are a “hoax.” It quoted a PEN spokesperson, who said, “We have always called Florida a blueprint state, because what happens in Florida in terms of book bans then kind of trickles out to other states.”

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