Supreme Court to Review School Refusing Parental Religious Opt-Out for LGBTQ+ Curriculum
Equal Protection Project considering filing an amicus brief supporting the parents’ right to opt their kids out of objectionable grade-school curriculum on religious grounds
We previously reported on the case of Maryland parents suing Montgomery County schools because they refused to let the parents opt their children out of grade-school LGBTQ+ curriculum featuring drag queens, transgender kids, and same-sex marriages. Spoiler alert: the Parents Motion for a Preliminary Injunction to force the schools to allow an opt-out was DENIED: Federal Court Rejects Muslim Parents Lawsuit to Opt Kids Out of LGBTQ+ Ideology in Montgomery County (MD) Schools:
Parents in Montgomery County in Maryland, many of whom are Muslims, wanted the ability to opt their children out of school lessons that include LGBT content and gender ideology.
A federal judge just ruled against them.
FOX News reports:
Maryland Court says parents can’t opt kids out of LGBTQ+ curriculum: ‘Not a fundamental right’
A federal court in Maryland decided Thursday that parents can’t opt their kids out of reading books with LGBTQ+ content in Montgomery County Schools.
In Tamer Mahmoud v. Monica B. McKnight, parents sought to reinstate a MCPS policy that would allow them to opt their children out of reading and discussing books with LGBTQ+ characters in elementary schools. The parents argued the content in these books was a form of indoctrination that violated their families’ religious beliefs.
The court disagreed. Judge Deborah L. Boardman, a Biden appointee, concluded that the parents’ “asserted due process right to direct their children’s upbringing by opting out of a public-school curriculum that conflicts with their religious views is not a fundamental right.”
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NBC News in Washington has more:
Some of the books at the center of the clash include “Pride Puppy,” geared toward preschoolers and “Uncle Bobby’s Wedding,” geared toward students in kindergarten through 5th grade.
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The parents suing the school district filed the lawsuit because they believe MCPS is infringing on their religious rights.
They wanted to be able to immediately opt their children out of lessons involving LGBTQ+ books, “to represent the right of parents to protect their religious training and upbringings of their children,” said Eric Baxter, attorney for the group of parents.
“We want to be able to be in control of what our children are learning in school,” father Dagmawi Lakew said on Aug. 9 in an interview outside the federal court.
“You feel like your rights as a parent are just being stripped away,” he said.
We also reported about the result after the parents appealed this ruling.
Guess what, they lost: Court of Appeals: Maryland Parents Can’t Opt-Out K-5 Kids from Public School LGBTQ Curriculum:
A federal court of appeals just held, in a 2-1 ruling, that Maryland parents cannot opt out of required LGBTQ grade school curriculum that exposes their kids as young as kindergarten to concepts like “intersex flag,” “drag queen,” “leather,” and other topics associated with the LGBTQ community.
Fox News has the story: Parents can’t opt K-5 children out of LGBTQ curriculum: appeals court:
Maryland’s largest school district does not have to allow parents to opt their K-5 children out of classes and books that discuss LGBTQ topics like sexuality and gender, at least for now, a federal appeals court ruled on Wednesday.
The 2-1 ruling by the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed a lower court decision denying a preliminary injunction on the basis that the parents had not shown how the policy — initiated by the Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS) board — would violate their children’s First Amendment right to free exercise of religion.
The parents had argued that refusal to provide an opt-out from their children’s exposure to LGBT-themed books and related discussions violates federal and state law.
The Plaintiffs are three sets of religiously observant parents, one Muslim and two Christian, who believe that the LGBT-themed books are harmful to their kids because it interferes with their religious upbringing. And how could it not, as it exposes kindergarteners, among other things, to a book entitled “The Pride Puppy” with drawings of drag queens performing on a stage, a cart with vegetables inside with a sign labeled “queer farmers,” and “an image of a celebrated LGBTQ activist and sex worker, ‘Marsha P. Johnson.’”
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You can review this awful ruling, if have the stomach for it, here.
The only bright light in this dismal ruling is that it was on appeal from the denial of a motion for preliminary injunction, i.e. a motion at the very start of the case, which asks the judge to stop the government from doing something before evidence is gathered, principals are deposed, etc. This means that while the court isn’t stopping the [extremely] objectionable practices right now, it might later…
The other sliver of good news is that there was a dissent in the case:
U.S. Circuit Judge A. Marvin Quattlebaum, Jr., who was appointed by former President Trump, dissented, writing that he disagreed with the district court motion finding the parents failed to establish that the board burdened their First Amendment rights.
“The parents have shown the board’s decision to deny religious opt-outs burdened these parents’ right to exercise their religion and direct the religious upbringing of their children by putting them to the choice of either compromising their religious beliefs or foregoing a public education for their children,” Quattlebaum wrote.
“I also find that the board’s actions, at least under this record, were neither neutral nor generally applicable. Finally, I find the parents have established the other requirements for a preliminary injunction. So, I would reverse the district court and enjoin the Montgomery County School Board of Education from denying religious opt-outs for instruction to K-5 children involving the texts.”
So the parents commenced the laborious process of getting the U.S. Supreme Court to review the case, always a hard sell, and lo and behold, SCOTUS took the case!
From CBS News: Supreme Court takes up Maryland parents’ bid to opt kids out of lessons with LGBTQ books:
The Supreme Court on Friday agreed to take up a dispute over whether a Maryland school district violated parents’ religious rights when it declined to allow them to opt their elementary school children out of instruction involving storybooks about gender and sexuality.
The dispute centers around a decision by the Montgomery County School Board to end opt-out requests and notice requirements for the reading and discussion of storybooks that feature LGBTQ characters. The case sets up another clash involving LGBTQ rights and religious rights. It’s unclear whether the Supreme Court will hear arguments in its current term, which ends this summer, or its next term that will begin in October.
The books were approved for the Montgomery County Public Schools language-arts curriculum for the 2022-2023 school year as part of an effort to include new material that better represents the school district’s students and families, it said. Montgomery County is Maryland’s largest county and its school system serves more than 160,000 students.
Books introduced for students include titles like “Pride Puppy,” a picture book about a dog that gets lost at a Pride parade, and “Jacob’s Room to Choose,” about two transgender school-aged children…
After the books were introduced, some parents sought to have their children excused when they were read or discussed. Some of these so-called out-out requests were religious-based and others were not, according to court filings…
The district then announced in March 2023 that it wouldn’t allow opt-outs from language-arts instruction that involved the storybooks “for any reason.”
The decision sparked backlash from the community, and more than 1,000 parents signed a petition urging the board to reinstate their notice and opt-out requests. Hundreds also attended school board meetings and said they had religious obligations not to subject their children to gender and sexuality instruction that conflicted with their religious beliefs.
Following the school district’s announcement, in May 2023, three sets of parents sued the Montgomery County Board of Education, alleging their First Amendment and due process rights were violated. The lead challengers are Tamer Mahmoud and Enas Barakat, who are Muslim and have a son in elementary school. Also challenging the board’s move are Chris and Melissa Persak, who are Roman Catholic and have two elementary-age children, and Jeff and Svitlana Roman, who are Roman Catholic and Ukrainian Orthodox and have a son in elementary school.
They sought a court order that would require notice and opt outs when the books were read or discussed. The parents argued their children’s exposure to the books “necessarily establishes the existence of a burden” on their right to freely exercise their religion.
A federal district court denied the request, and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit upheld the decision.
The divided three-judge panel found that there was no evidence at that time that the families were compelled to change their religious beliefs or conduct, or what they taught their children.
The parents then appealed to the Supreme Court, arguing that the 4th Circuit’s decision effectively requires parents to “surrender their right to direct the religious upbringing of their children by sending them to public schools.”
“Under the Fourth Circuit’s reasoning, parents cannot be heard until after the damage has been done to their children. But there is no unringing that bell — by then, innocence will be lost and beliefs undermined,” they wrote in a filing.
You can review the parents’ entire Petition for a Writ of Certiorari, or request for the Supreme Court to review the case, here.
In the meantime, because briefs at the Supreme Court on the merits must be filed within 45 days of the Court agreeing to review the case, which it did on January 17, 2025, the parents’ brief is due on Monday March 3, 2025.
Although the case is a bit outside of the Equal Protection Project’s lane of racial/sex discrimination cases, EPP has gotten involved in prior cases involving religious issues, Northwestern U. Encampment Deal Establishing Preferences for “Palestinian” and “MENA/Muslim” Students Challenged By Equal Protection Project, and EPP is strongly considering filing an amicus, or friend-of-the-court, brief in the Supreme Court supporting the parents’ challenge to the Maryland schools’ refusal to let them opt their kids out of obviously objectionable curriculum.
Because an amicus brief at the Supreme Court on the merits is due seven days after the brief being supported is filed, EPP’s brief would be due Monday March 10, 2025.
Feel free to opine in the comments about whether EPP should file an amicus brief in this case, and what you suggest the best arguments are to get the Supreme Court to allow the opt-outs.
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Olympia School District is doing the same.
You couldn’t opt out as of fall 2022…. this was the straw that had us (and thousands more) pull our kid out.
Spoiler alert… Wa elected / re-elected everybody who made this possible.
Don’t use the religious route – these kind of books should be banned for all children regardless of their believes…
Indeed. Psychological manipulation of children should be banned from schools. This is just indoctrination to a lifestyle that has no basis other than a psychological pathology.
The term “freedom of religion” has been bastardized in their favor for too long. Since they have deemed their psychoses as a “religion,” parents should have the right to ban it or avoid it, just like they do to the Ten Commandments.
Your take, President Trump?
I think they should go the sexual abuse route, because that’s what this is. It’s early hyper sexualization and it’s going to screw up a lot of kids.
This is backwards. SCOTUS should be looking at prohibiting this LGBTQ+ Curriculum because it’s a RELIGION itself. It’s violating ‘separation of Church & State’ that the left has fallen in love with the last 100-years. If a public school can’t indoctrinate kids in Catholic dogma then it should be similarly barred from indoctrinating kids in ‘Pride’ dogma. No one should have to ‘opt out’ because the school shouldn’t be allowed to teach it.
Agreed. Here the School Board is using its power to enforce/require what it believes is virtuous/moral using LGBT issues the same way some small rural School Boards attempted to require active participation in sectarian Prayer/expression of worship. That’s just as much a 1A violation IMO.
If public school students can’t be required to participate in reciting the ‘Pledge of Allegiance’ which is about as mainstream and anodyne an expression in favor of the USA as it gets then a public school can’t require students to participate in a positive/affirming reading of LGBT books.
All these controversial school programs, especially those touching on sexuality, should be opt-in if the concept of liberty is to be respected.
Of course your liberty is far, far from the mindset of the left. Therefore the default position is opt-out.
And why isn’t it elect in? Because the choice architects know to a certainty that socialist minded programs would not be popular so to make them popular you decree it to be so. In the process you make anyone who would want to be outside the program to be the odd odd ball, the one who has to go through thru the deliberately-made arduous process of opting out. It’s an old socialist truck communist trick. It plays off of the natural human instinct of not acting, inertia. It is mean, devious and ever so typically leftist. Easy what is definitively is not is liberty minded. The left hates freedom. Do as we say and everything will be fine. Go against us and there will be trouble. For you.
The Default Position and Choice Architects. That conclusion which the choice architect wants us to arrive at without any of us knowing how we got to that point, or arriving at that predetermined point with the inner feeling that we arrived there all by ourselves. Fancy title, Choice Architect. Akin to a Change Facilitator. What such folks do it frame the debate so that a pre-determined result becomes, presto-chango, the arrived-at result. These are the tricks of the indoctrinators among us.
Google Opt Out Feature Lets Users Protect Privacy By Moving To Remote Village,
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lMChO0qNbkY
Now let me get there, but:
I DO NOT like religious opt-outs for school curriculums or vaccines.
Because it carries with it the implicit ruling that NO OTHER objection to vaccines or curriculums is legitimate.
And that’s one of the main reasons homeschooling has become so much more prevalent in the last 30 years.
Good observation. Freedom of conscience isn’t dependent upon a belief in a particular ‘approved’ religious doctrine. Parents have the duty and responsibility for upbringing of their children and thus have the authority to do this in the manner they see fit with very few limitations. The State mandating exposure to weirdo philosophy or untested ‘vax’ isn’t, IMO, lawful.
While its not the only reason to object to LBGQTXXX indoctrination, clearly the school and the courts are telling parents how they are allowed to practice their religion.
Its not even a stretch to say that requiring the youngest of children to be forcibly exposed to deviant sexual behaviors is going to be objectionable to virtually every devout person of virtually any religion.
The courts are essentially saying parents have no right to object because WE the court will tell you what is or is not important in your religious beliefs.
It can’t possibly stand.
Seems like further evidence parents need to get their kids out of public indoctrination.
This filth and its purveyors should be removed from all public schools!
Society is totally decadent, when one must seek a special religious exemption to keep those entrusted with the education and safety of one’s children, from habitually exposing them to graphic sexual perversion.
“…drawings of drag queens performing on a stage…”
My parents never took me to the heterosexual version of this when I was in grade school. They didn’t drag me to the cocktail lounge for a smoke and a beer. These people are out of their tiny little minds!
File it! Do you believe you have something to add to the discussion?
Concur. Equal protection has to include parental rights. Or does it? “The law is an ass,” especially in the hands of judicial activists.
Reading, writing, math, history , english are what schools were created to teach, schools do not have the right to engage in social topics especially when those topics lead to the sexual perversion of our children. As parents you have the responsibility and the right to rise up against those who seek to harm your children.
Hopefully SCOTUS will put paid to this sexual perversion and indoctrination. I worry about Roberts though. He’s far more interested in his legacy than ruling with common sense. The 3 worthless women, and maybe Barrett will rule against the parents. That’s pretty much a given. Now that President Trump has made the logical order about an and woman being the only genders perhaps the court will rule correctly. We shall see.
Hopefully SCOTUS will put paid to this sexual perversion and indoctrination. I worry about Roberts though. He’s far more interested in his legacy than ruling with common sense. The 3 worthless women, and maybe Barrett will rule against the parents. That’s pretty much a given. Now that President Trump has made the logical order about man and woman being the only genders perhaps the court will rule correctly. We shall see.
They need to apply the test for the court: in an analogous situation, would be they allow teaching the bible or real biology in these schools?
For quite some time now, I have failed to understand why these controversies about Public School-based indoctrination ignore the 1943 Barnette decision in which the famous Justice Robert Jackson wrote:
“If there is any fixed star in our constitutional constellation, it is that no official, high or petty, can prescribe what shall be orthodox in politics, nationalism, religion, or other matters of opinion or force citizens to confess by word or act their faith therein. If there are any circumstances which permit an exception, they do not now occur to us.”
That case was about the First Amendment, and about some Jehovah’s Witness parents who objected to their children being forced to participate in the daily flag salute and pledge of allegiance. The Court decided they could not be forced to do those things, which I personally would not have objected to for my children; but at the same time I believe that decision was correct. And to think that it came down in the midst of WWII, when patriotism was high; and after the war Justice Jackson would preside over the Nuremberg trials of the Nazi war criminals.
The case was: U.S. Supreme Court: West Virginia State Board of Education et al. v. Barnette et al., 319 U.S. 624 (1943),
Count the number of adults that your child will interact with on a regular basis in the public school system.
It’s inconceivable that your child will not be under the supervision of a child molester at some point between K and HS graduation.
That doesn’t include the drug/alcohol-involved adults within the school system.
Nor does it include the ideologically-driven zealots who encourage your child to hate America, to love Mao, etc, etc
That’s just the adults that you let your children interact with , unsupervised, day after day, year after year.
Then there are the disturbed classmates and the disturbed upperclassmen who may well be prescribed psychiatric medicine and may be seriously contemplating shooting up the place — but confidentiality laws prohibit you from knowing that your child attends school every day with a teen contemplating mass murder..
Fwiw I posted this before hearing about school shooting in Antioch, Tennessee
We have always used schools to promote certain social values, and now we have allowed perversion to be promoted there as well. This has already done considerable damage to a whole generation, and as a psychiatrist I’m seeing an increasing incidence of sexual incompetence in young people who have been taught that they are not ok unless they are ok about being not ok. So it comes as no surprise to see increasing declines in marriage and in fertility amongst those who have traditionally been the most enthusiastic about both. Misery loves company, and we have allowed some very miserable people to gain access to our children.