Attorney General Alan Wilson leads 12-state coalition appealing case that undermines parental rights

(COLUMBIA, S.C.) – Attorney General Alan Wilson led a 12-state coalition that filed a brief Wednesday with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit in a case about protecting parental rights. The brief asks the Court of Appeals to reverse a lower court that dismissed a lawsuit brought by a parent when a school allegedly helped a student with their gender transition without the parent’s knowledge.

“Schools have to get a parent’s permission to give a child medicine or take a child on a field trip, so it’s ridiculous to think schools should be able to help a child with something as drastic as gender transition without informing a parent,” Attorney General Wilson said.

The brief argues that some states have expressly banned policies that withhold this information from parents. “Withholding policies often not only violate these state laws but also infringe fundamental, long-standing constitutional rights,” the attorneys general write in their brief.

In the case, a parent sued her local school board and several school officials after they allegedly withheld information about her child’s gender identity. She says school officials did not tell her that her child was using a new name and that school officials were referring to the child by new gender pronouns. School officials also allegedly did not tell the parent that a school employee gave her child two chest binders to assist in gender transition.

The attorneys general argue that the school in this case, and the lower court that dismissed the lawsuit, failed to account for the right of parents to “direct the upbringing and education of children under their control.”

You can read the brief here.