Judge Blocks Calif. Schools' Gender-Secrecy Policies

A federal judge has ordered California schools to halt enforcement of "parental exclusion policies," issuing a class-wide permanent injunction in a ruling that supporters described as a major victory for parental rights.

U.S. District Judge Roger Benitez granted summary judgment Monday in favor of parents and teachers challenging the policies and permanently barred their enforcement statewide.

The policies required school officials to withhold information from parents when a student expressed a change in gender identity or requested a different name or pronouns, a practice Benitez said violates the Constitution.

"Parents and guardians have a federal constitutional right to be informed if their public school student child expresses gender incongruence," Benitez, a George W. Bush appointee on the Southern District of California bench, wrote in issuing the injunction.

"Teachers and school staff have a federal constitutional right to accurately inform the parent or guardian of their student when the student expresses gender incongruence.

"These federal constitutional rights are superior to any state or local laws, state or local regulations, or state or local policies to the contrary."

The case stems from an April 2023 lawsuit filed by Elizabeth Mirabelli and Lori Ann West, teachers at Rincon Middle School near San Diego.

The Christian educators challenged the Escondido Union School District policies that required them to use student-requested pronouns or gender-specific names while keeping that information secret from parents.

The plaintiffs secured a preliminary injunction in September 2023. The case was later expanded into a class action on behalf of parents and teachers statewide.

California argued that withholding the information protected students from discrimination, abuse, and harassment.

"Preventing student bullying and harassment in school is a laudable goal," Benitez wrote in his summary judgment. "The problem is that the parental exclusion policies seem to presume that it is the parents that will be the harassers from whom students need to be protected.

"Even if the [state] could demonstrate that excluding parents was good policy on some level, such a policy cannot be implemented at the expense of parents' constitutional rights."

Benitez said the policies were rooted in an improper elevation of student privacy over parental rights.

"The state bases its legal position on a derogation of the parents' federal constitutional right to care for and raise their children and an unwarranted aggrandizing of a student's state-created right to privacy," he wrote.

"California's education policymakers may be experts on primary and secondary education, but they would not receive top grades as students of Constitutional Law."

In a joint statement issued by their legal team, the conservative Thomas More Society, Mirabelli and West welcomed the ruling.

"We are profoundly grateful for today's ruling," they said. "This has been a long and difficult journey, and we are humbled by the support we've received along the way.

"We loved our jobs, our students, and the school communities we served. But we were forced into an impossible position when school officials demanded that we lie to parents — violating not only our faith, but also the trust that must exist between teachers and families.

"No educator should ever be placed in that situation. This victory is not just ours. It is a win for honesty, transparency, and the fundamental rights of teachers and parents."

Greg Burt, vice president of the California Family Council, hailed the ruling in a Monday statement.

"This ruling vindicates what parents' rights advocates have been saying all along," Burt said. "The state told schools they had to keep secrets from moms and dads, and that was never true.

"A federal judge has now made it unmistakably clear: children do not belong to the government, parents have the right to know what's happening with their own kids, and teachers should never be forced to lie or stay silent to keep their jobs."

Moms for Liberty called the ruling "A HUGE victory for parents" in a Tuesday post on X.

A spokesperson for California Attorney General Rob Bonta told Newsmax the state has filed an application to stay Benitez's injunction pending appeal.

"We believe that the district court misapplied the law and that the decision will ultimately be reversed on appeal," the spokesperson said.

"We are committed to securing school environments that allow transgender students to safely participate as their authentic selves while recognizing the important role that parents play in students' lives."