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If anyone thinks the fight over transgender policies in public schools has been won, think again.
In the span of just eight days, the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear not one, but two significant cases involving public schools that secretly encouraged children to socially transition to the opposite sex — without parental knowledge and in some cases over direct parental objection. Social transitioning means adopting a new name, new pronouns, opposite-sex clothing, and a new gender expression — all reinforced by school staff while parents are kept completely in the dark.
The most recent denial came from a Florida case involving a thirteen-year-old girl with developmental delays who began questioning her gender identity. Her parents hired a private therapist and explicitly told the school they opposed any social transitioning. The school ignored them entirely — secretly labeling their daughter nonbinary, mandating that all staff use “they and them pronouns,” allowing her to use boys’ bathrooms, and refusing to share school records with her own parents. Even the appellate judge who sided with the school called the school’s treatment of the parents shameful. The Supreme Court still refused to step in.
A week earlier, the Court declined a nearly identical case out of Massachusetts, where an eleven-year-old girl was secretly transitioned by her school despite her parents repeatedly directing the district not to interfere. The court there actually ruled that an eleven-year-old’s preferences outweighed her parents’ rights! And yet, that school’s gender counseling somehow had nothing to do with the child’s mental health?
That is where we are. The Supreme Court has now turned away anti-parent decisions from five separate federal circuits — the First, Fourth, Seventh, Tenth, and Eleventh. Nearly half the states filed briefs urging the Court to take up these parental rights cases. The Court said no.
The one exception this year remains the California case, Mirabelli v. Bonta, where the Court did intervene on emergency grounds. But that case is still being litigated and doesn’t directly protect parents outside California.
This is quite disappointing, especially given a string of good decisions the last two terms on similar parental rights issues. Let’s be clear — this battle is far from over. Schools are still hiding “social transition” from parents. Courts are still letting them. And the Supreme Court is still looking away.
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