Yesterday evening, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a remarkable decision that struck a major blow against secret gender transition policies in public schools across the country.
We’ve been keeping you informed about these despicable policies in Massachusetts public schools, which require teachers to lie to parents about their own children and cover up students’ gender dysphoria. In 2022, we filed a federal lawsuit against Ludlow Public Schools after staff there hid a child’s gender confusion from her parents and then continued calling her by the wrong pronouns even after the parents demanded that they stop socially transitioning their child. Last summer, we filed a petition to the U.S. Supreme Court to hear our case, which is still pending before the Court.
Yesterday’s Supreme Court decision dramatically changed the legal landscape. The case, Mirabelli v. Bonta, involves strikingly similar facts to our own case in Ludlow: California passed a law that requires schools to hide students’ gender identities from parents unless the students consent, and requires teachers to use students’ “preferred pronouns” even if parents object. After parents sued, a federal district court issued a permanent injunction that forced the state to back down. But when California appealed the decision, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals put the injunction on hold.
Now, however, the U.S. Supreme court has granted the parents’ emergency petition to put the injunction back in place. The Court issued a short opinion stating that the parents were likely to succeed not only on their religious liberty claims against the California laws but also on their parental rights claims. It stated that “under long-established precedent, parents—not the State—have primary authority with respect to the upbringing and education of children.”
This is a resounding win for parents. While this opinion was not a final decision on the merits of the case, it strongly signals to lawmakers and schools that secret transition policies are unconstitutional. However, final victory won’t be achieved until the Supreme Court sets a binding precedent in a case – like our case out of Ludlow – and definitively holds that schools cannot conceal students’ gender dysphoria from parents. We are more optimistic than ever that this will happen soon. The future of thousands of children may depend on it.
Please join us in praying for final victory on this issue and support MFI so that we can continue to protect parental rights!