An Elbert County school district confirmed on Friday to a federal judge that it has restored 19 restricted books to library shelves after she found the school board likely violated the First Amendment rights of students and authors by removing the titles for ideological reasons.

Earlier this week, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit declined to suspend, or stay, a preliminary injunction issued by U.S. District Court Judge Charlotte N. Sweeney. Previously, Sweeney ordered the Elizabeth School District to return the restricted books to libraries, and she set a specific date of April 5. The 10th Circuit put that order temporarily on hold while it took an initial look at the case, before ultimately deciding against intervention.

With the April 5 deadline having passed, Sweeney issued a new directive on Thursday: The district must return the books and certify its compliance with her order by noon on Friday.

“Defendant Elizabeth School District, through undersigned counsel, certifies that it returned the Removed Books to their respective libraries on or before May 1, 2025, pending a final trial on Plaintiffs’ request for a permanent injunction or other resolution,” the district’s lawyers wrote in a filing submitted on Friday morning.

The attorneys also indicated one book had been returned to its library before Sweeney’s injunction.

In December, the parents of two district students, the local NAACP chapter and The Authors Guild — representing authors of the removed books — sued the district, alleging a violation of the First Amendment and its counterpart provision of the Colorado Constitution. The district made a total of 19 books unavailable in schools, with parents noting their objections to “evil trans ideology” offensive content “for most religious people” and the “depravity of Islam,” among other themes.

The affected titles included “The Kite Runner” by Khaled Hosseini and “Beloved” by Toni Morrison, as well as “#Pride: Championing LGBTQ Rights” by Rebecca Felix, “The Hate U Give” by Angie Thomas and “Thirteen Reasons Why” by Jay Asher.

Sweeney, a Joe Biden appointee, decided in March the plaintiffs were likely to succeed on their claims of a constitutional violation. Writing that the board’s actions implicated the plaintiffs’ rights, and not the government’s own speech, she relied on board members’ communications with each other to conclude they had impermissibly removed the books because they disagreed with the viewpoints expressed.

“Plaintiffs have shown that the District removed the 19 books based on the authors’ and books’ content and viewpoints on issues such as race, sexual orientation, gender identity, LGBTQ content, and to promote the Board’s self-proclaimed ‘conservative values,'” wrote Sweeney, Colorado’s first openly gay federal judge.

Although the district argued to the 10th Circuit that Sweeney had inserted herself as the “de-facto library czar,” the appeals court did not believe the district was entitled to relief from Sweeney’s injunction. The appeal will continue to proceed, although the 10th Circuit permitted Sweeney to move the case forward in her court as it addresses the injunction.

The case is Crookshanks et al. v. Elizabeth School District.