Alaska Attorney General Treg Taylor and 15 other attorneys general have filed an amicus brief with the U.S. Supreme Court regarding schools that help students make “social gender transitions” without their parents’ knowledge. Such as transition would include using a different bathroom, locker room, name, or gender pronoun at school and keeping that information secret from the parents.

Virginia Attorney General Jason Miyares is leading the amicus. “It is essential that schools work with parents, not against them, to support a child’s well-being,” Miyares said. “Parents have the right to be involved in major decisions affecting their children’s lives.” 

As has occurred in the Anchorage School District, the Eau Claire, Wisconsin. school district enacted rules to help students change their identities at school and keep that information from their parents. The district is at the heart of this parent-driven lawsuit.

The district policies, as in Anchorage, allows male students to use the female bathrooms and locker rooms, according to how they feel their gender should be, or allowing boy-like females to use males’ private facilities.

The Eau Claire district told administrators to develop “Student Gender Support Plan(s),” which could include information on students’ medical and surgical transition intentions.

“Amici States have a compelling interest in protecting parents’ fundamental right to make decisions about “the care, custody, and control of their children,” the brief to the Supreme Court stated. “In fact, many Amici States have constitutional or legal protections for parents’ rights enshrined in state law. This case presents the opportunity for this Court to reiterate that government officials cannot interfere with this right—“perhaps the oldest of the fundamental liberty interests recognized by” this Court—just because the government officials believe that they know better.”

The Seventh Circuit dismissed the case, concluding that the parents who are challenging the school district’s gender transition policy had not asserted a concrete injury because they did not allege that the policy had been applied to their specific students.

The state attorney generals said, “This conclusion, however, is based on an erroneously cramped view of parental rights and this Court’s precedents. The parent-child relationship is directly harmed when a school district tells minor students that secrets from their parents—including an entire double life at school— are not only acceptable, but will be facilitated by the District. The district’s policy also hopelessly conflicts with constitutionally protected parental rights. Parents, not administrators, have the responsibility and right to raise their children.”

“The Seventh Circuit’s decision thus contributes to a rapidly-expanding — and increasingly confusing — area of law. Gender transition policies like the one at issue in this case have proliferated around the country. Unsurprisingly, so has litigation over these policies. Judicial decisions arising from these challenges are a jumbled mess, with many courts evicting parents from the courthouse on standing grounds, and few reaching the merits to protect parents’ rights. This Court’s intervention is needed to bring clarity, before more parents and children are injured,” the brief said.

The school district in Wisconsin has a written statement about its responsibility to keep parents informed of student welfare and progress in school. But not for gender issues, evidently. Those are different.

“Yet Respondents’ Gender Identity Support guidance blocks parents from learning more about certain aspects of their children’s conduct in school. Because, according to the guidance, ‘[s]ome transgender, non-binary, and/or gender-non- conforming students are not ‘open’ at home for reasons that may include safety concerns or lack of acceptance,’ Respondents allowed students to make changes to their gender identity, names, and pronouns without parental notice or consent,” the brief said.

In other words, the school can decide what aspect of a child’s “welfare and progress” could be discussed with the parent, stripping parents of their right to know.

A petition for a writ of certiorari was filed by the Wisconsin Institute for Law and Liberty, and America First Legal. They want the Supreme Court to decide if parents have legal standing to challenge what is “an explicit policy to usurp parental decision making” and to programmatically conceal student information from parents. Key to the lawsuit is the question of how a parent could even have standing to sue a school district for concealing such major life-changing information if the parent is not made aware of that information.

Alaska Attorney General Treg Taylor, Miyares, and the other attorneys general point out an opinion from Judge Paul Niemeyer of the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals, which said such a school policy undermines parents’ constitutional rights and that parents didn’t have an option of choosing another policy for their children.

“This case presents an opportunity for the U.S. Supreme Court to provide much-needed clarity and reaffirm that government officials cannot override parents’ fundamental rights simply because they believe they know better,” Miyares said.

The amicus brief describes training that is given to teachers that put them in positions between parents and students. The training material is “targeting religious parents for special condemnation, claiming that the ‘weaponization of religious beliefs against marginalized people is the problem.'” and that “parents are not entitled to know their kids’ identities. That knowledge must be earned.”

In addition to Taylor and Miyares, the other attorneys general represent Georgia, Idaho, Louisiana, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas, Utah, and West Virginia.