A Federal Judge Just Blocked a School District’s ‘Transgender’ Policy That Harms Children and Infringes on Parents’ Rights

Two teachers who work in the Escondido Union School District filed a lawsuit to stop enforcement of a “transgender” policy that would prevent school officials from telling parents that their children are going through a mental health “transgender” crisis.

The policy in the Escondido, California, school district is couched in terms of privacy, but school officials essentially promise students that they will keep secrets from their parents. The country is in the middle of a politically charged debate about so-called health care professionals rendering children permanently sterile.

Teachers Elizabeth Mirabelli and Lori Ann West do not want to keep secrets from parents. How would parents feel if school officials kept a student’s sports injury a secret? Or a sexual assault? It’s safe to say most parents wouldn’t like it. Why is a mental health crisis any different?

The plaintiffs’ argument persuaded U.S. District Judge Roger Benitez, and he temporarily blocked enforcement of the policy while litigation is still ongoing.

The school district said the policy aligns with state law, so California residents who oppose keeping minors’ “gender identity” a secret have to lobby lawmakers to change the law. But this is California we’re talking about. The courts might be the people’s only hope.

Although the legislature said that minors “enjoy a right to privacy under Article I, Section I of the California Constitution that is enforceable against private parties and government officials,” Judge Benitez doesn’t agree.

The judge wrote (PDF) that the school district’s “policy of elevating a child’s gender-related choices to that of paramount importance, while excluding a parent from knowing of, or participating in, that kind of choice, is as foreign to federal constitutional and statutory law as it is medically unwise.” (emphasis added)

Judge Benitez called the school’s policy on keeping secrets from parents “a trifecta of harm: it harms the child who needs parental guidance and possibly mental health intervention to determine if the incongruence is organic or whether it is the result of bullying, peer pressure, or a fleeting impulse.”

Judge Benitez touch on another important aspect of the school district’s policy.

“And finally, it harms plaintiffs who are compelled to violate the parent’s rights by forcing plaintiffs to conceal information they feel is critical for the welfare of their students – violating plaintiffs’ religious beliefs.”

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