Christmas for California Parents

On the Monday before Christmas, U.S. District Judge Roger T. Benitez ruled that California’s policy of forcing schools to hide children’s gender transitions from their own parents is a violation of their constitutional rights. In his 52-page opinion, Judge Benitez wrote:

These parental exclusion policies are designed to create a zone of secrecy around a school student who expresses gender incongruity. The policies restrain public school teachers and staff from informing parents about a child’s unusual gender expression, unless the child consents. The policies apply to children as young as two and as old as 17. The policies do not permit teachers to use their own judgment in responding to an inquiring parent…

The parental exclusion policies create a trifecta of harm: they harm 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. They harm the parents by depriving them of the long-recognized 14th Amendment right to care, guide, and make health care decisions for their children, and by substantially burdening many parents’ First Amendment right to train their children in their sincerely held religious beliefs. And finally, they harm teachers who are compelled to violate their sincerely held beliefs and the parents’ rights by forcing them to conceal information they feel is critical for the welfare of their students.

Plaintiffs Elizabeth Mirabelli and Lori Ann West, Christian teachers from the Escondido Union School District, stated, “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. This victory is not just ours. It is a win for honesty, transparency, and the fundamental rights of teachers and parents.”  Mirabelli and West were joined by parents whose children suffered irreversible harm from the state secrecy policy. Supporters of that policy were quick to respond

“We believe that the district court misapplied the law and that the decision will ultimately be reversed on appeal,” wrote Attorney General Rob Bonta in a statement, expressing a commitment to policies that “allow transgender students to safely participate as their authentic selves, while recognizing the important role that parents play in students’ lives.”

The American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California called the case “part of a nationwide, coordinated attack on trans people and all those who stand up for trans youth” and will also pursue an appeal. As the appeals proceed, parents might focus on another part of Judge Benitez’s ruling:

Some parents who do not want such barriers may have the wherewithal to place their children in private schools or homeschool, or to move to a different public school district. Families in middle or lower socio-economic circumstances have no such options.

The children of those families, in effect, are captives to the government education establishment. The secrecy policy derives from Assembly Bill 1955, signed by Governor Gavin Newsom in July 2024. The governor, who lives in a $9 million mansion in upscale Marin County, sends his own children to exclusive private schools that charge annual tuition of $60,000.

Newsom, who boasts connections to the Brown, Pelosi, and Getty families, has never supported policies that allow working parents to choose the schools their children attend, funded by their tax dollars. In similar style, the state and federal education establishments fiercely oppose parental choice.

In Washington, D.C., the only option for low-income parents is the DC Opportunity Scholarships Program. President Obama’s education secretary, Arne Duncan, not only opposed the program but also canceled scholarships already granted. That sent the students back to dangerous and dysfunctional government schools.

California’s last ballot measure for school choice was Proposition 174 in 1993. The education establishment, teacher unions, and state Democrats all opposed it. So did Republican Governor Pete Wilson and the ACLU.

“We’ve long advocated against taxpayer funds being used for private and religious schools,” the ACLU explains, because “beyond harming religious liberty, vouchers lead to taxpayer-funded discrimination,” which is nonsense.  There is no valid educational, legal or moral argument against school choice, only political objections.

As parents and taxpayers will recall, under the G.I. Bill, a student could take his government scholarship to UCLA, Brigham Young, or Notre Dame, which did not lead to discrimination. The nation needs a new bill of rights that allows parents to send their children to the school of their choice, with the dollars following the scholars.

California’s secrecy policy recalls the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), which separated children from their parents and transformed schools into indoctrination centers. Judge Benitez’s ruling should motivate the Trump administration to push for parental choice in K-12 education nationwide, as a matter of basic civil rights.