A federal judge has declined to rule on a lawsuit brought by a Leon County middle school student’s parents, who alleged that district employees illegally counseled their daughter about her gender-confusion issues without their consent.
Judge Mark Walker of the Northern District of Florida ruled last month dismissed the lawsuit brought by January and Jeffrey Littlejohn against the Leon County School District. They argued that a Deerlake Middle School counselor and other staff members developed a support plan for the student, identified as “A.G.” in the complaint, allowing her to choose a preferred name, preferred pronouns and preferred restroom without parental involvement.
The school’s actions violated the plaintiffs’ parental rights as outlined in both the federal and state constitutions, according to the lawsuit.
The parents’ federal claims hinge on due-process rights that carry a high burden to establish a pleading, Walker said in the Dec. 22 opinion. The precedent was imposed by both the U.S. Supreme Court and the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals, according to the opinion.
“These claims, as presently alleged, fail to clear the high standard that binding case law requires,” the opinion states. “Relatedly, because plaintiffs’ remaining claims raise novel and complex issues of state law, this court declines to exercise supplemental jurisdiction over plaintiffs’ state-law claims. A state court, not this court, is best suited to answer these weighty questions of state law. …”
The president and general counsel of the Child and Parent Rights Campaign, the nonprofit law firm that represented the parents, said she was disappointed with Walker’s ruling and disagreed with its treatment of parental rights.
“We have filed a notice of appeal to the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals,” Vernadette Broyles told the Florida Record. “We are optimistic that the Court of Appeals will overturn the ruling, particularly in light of longstanding U.S. Supreme Court precedent and the 11th Circuit's en banc decision in Adams v. School Board of St John's County.”
In the Adams case, the appeals court concluded that the School Board of St John's County’s policy of segregating bathrooms based on the sex of the student at birth, not the gender the student may now identify with, did not violate federal law. In short, students have no federal legal right to use the bathroom of the opposite sex, the appeals court said.