Thanks to a Gov. Gavin Newsom-backed law, a California mom and dad did not find out about their daughter’s deteriorating mental health until she attempted suicide. This tragic situation was forced upon this loving family by a California state law that forces school staff to facilitate students’ social transitions, as early as the fifth grade, and to withhold from parents this important information about their children.
The Supreme Court must address this problem. Parental rights cases that challenge public school gender policies have been brought in at least 10 of the 13 Federal Circuits.
Now the Supreme Court can again address this injustice. The most recent, Mirabelli v. Bonta, is a class action involving parents and teachers. The Supreme Court has a duty to protect American children by reiterating what it has already made clear: Parents have a fundamental right to direct the upbringing of their children.
Two Christian middle school teachers initiated the case after the Escondido Union School District refused their requests for religious exemptions. The district determined the privacy of the students to be more important than the religious convictions of the teachers. Thus, the district forced the teachers to use preferred pronouns and gender identities for kids while at school but required the teachers to use biologically accurate pronouns when communicating with parents.
Later, parents joined the suit, converting the case into a class action. The Poe family did not learn of their daughter’s deteriorating mental health, caused by the district’s social transition campaign, until she attempted suicide. Unable to afford private school, the Poe family transferred their daughter to another public school “expressly requesting notice of her gender expression.” The school refused.
Unable to escape the public school system, these parents have fewer rights. The right to direct the upbringing of your children should not depend on your financial ability to remove your children from public schools.
Although the district court granted relief from the school’s overbearing gender policies, the Ninth Circuit ordered a stay that keeps the gender policies in effect.
Rather than faithfully apply the Supreme Court’s ruling in Mahmoud v. Taylor, the Ninth Circuit applied an unpublished opinion from another lower court. Thus, the Ninth Circuit’s order limited Mahmoud to apply only to religious burdens imposed by “curricular instruction.” The Ninth Circuit said that while religious parents have a right to opt-out of specific curriculum, the parents cannot opt out of “general operational policies,” such as the school’s parental exclusion policy for transitioning kids.
The Circuit courts must faithfully apply the precedents of the Supreme Court. Yet the Ninth Circuit’s interpretation of, or perhaps blatant disregard for, Mahmoud demonstrates why parental rights cannot be conditioned on a willingness to claim a religious exemption, especially when school districts determine that privacy overrules religious exercise.
Beyond Mahmoud, the Supreme Court reiterated in 2000 that “it cannot now be doubted that the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment protects the fundamental right of parents to make decisions concerning the care, custody, and control of their children.” Though perhaps ignored, the Supreme Court’s rulings upholding parental rights have been consistent and clear.
Unless the Supreme Court applies its parental rights jurisprudence to public school gender indoctrination campaigns, parents who are neither religious nor wealthy will remain unable to exercise their parental rights.
Sidelining parents plays politics with the lives and formation of our future generations. We hope the Supreme Court will reverse the Ninth Circuit’s order and reiterate that parental rights extend to all parents regardless of religion or affluence.
Marc Wheat is the General Counsel of Advancing American Freedom Vice President Mike Pence, Founder. Follow us on X @AAFLegal.
The views and opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and do not reflect the official position of the Daily Caller News Foundation.
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