The Justice Department filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against the Loudoun County School Board in Virginia, alleging the district violated the constitutional and religious rights of two Christian students who were punished after reporting a locker-room incident that conflicted with the district's gender-identity policy.
According to the complaint, the two Stone Bridge High School boys were suspended for 10 days after they and several classmates reported that a female student had entered the boys' locker room and allegedly recorded audio and video of them.
The students said they objected based on their religious beliefs, which require adherence to biological definitions of sex and the use of sex-segregated facilities.
The lawsuit centers on Loudoun County's controversial Policy 8040, a gender-identity rule that the DOJ said forces students and staff to "accept and promote gender ideology" even when it conflicts with their faith. Prosecutors argue the policy put the boys in an impossible position.
"Plaintiffs faced a choice: violate their consciences or stay true to their beliefs," the lawsuit states.
Instead of investigating the boys' concerns, the district ruled that the two Christian students had committed "sex-based discrimination" and "sexual harassment," the DOJ said.
Loudoun County then imposed the 10-day suspension and required the boys to submit to a "Comprehensive Student Support Plan," which the lawsuit characterizes as a form of compelled ideological compliance.
The Justice Department contends these actions violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment and trampled the boys' right to live out their religious beliefs in a public school setting.
"Students do not shed their First Amendment rights at the schoolhouse gate," said Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon, who leads the DOJ's Civil Rights Division. "Loudoun County's decision to advance and promote gender ideology tramples on the rights of religious students who cannot embrace ideas that deny biological reality."
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