A federal appeals court has revived a New York mother’s lawsuit against a public school that socially sex-transitioned her daughter without her knowledge or consent.
Yesterday, the three-judge panel of the Second Circuit Court of Appeals vacated the lower court’s dismissal of her constitutional claims and remanded for reconsideration in light of the Supreme Court’s ruling in Mirabelli v. Bonta.
We covered the case, Vitsaxaki v. Skaneateles Central School District, in more detail here:
To recap briefly, New York mother Jennifer Vitsaxaki sued the Skaneateles Central School District in 2024, alleging school staff had treated her 12-year-old daughter “Jane” as a boy, referring to her by a new masculine name and new third-person pronouns—all without her parents’ knowledge or consent.
Under the school’s gender identity policy, the student calls the shots: The district permits students “to determine when, how, and if to notify their parents of their decision to elect a chosen name and/or pronouns at school.”
Vitsaxaki claimed that the policy violated her constitutional rights, including both her religious and parental rights to direct her daughter’s upbringing, education, and healthcare—all of which were rejected by federal district court Judge David Hurd last year.
Judge Hurd applied the more permissive “rational basis” test—rejecting the mother’s argument for “strict scrutiny”—and concluded the school’s policy furthered its legitimate interest in promoting a “safe” learning environment, calling it more “like a civility code that extends the kind of decency students should expect at school.”
The mother appealed to the Second Circuit, and while her case was pending, the Supreme Court issued its ruling in Mirabelli, where parents challenged a similar California school gender policy.
Under California guidelines, public school teachers are not allowed to notify parents when their child changes their name and pronouns to “identify” as the opposite sex, unless they have the student’s consent.
In its preliminary ruling, the Supreme Court blocked the policies, concluding the parents were likely to succeed on their free exercise and due process claims. Referencing its earlier decision in Mahmoud v. Taylor, the Court determined such policies likely trigger strict scrutiny—and rejected the State’s argument that student safety and privacy justify them, because “those policies cut out the primary protectors of children’s best interests: their parents.”
Mirabelli shifted the legal landscape in a way that, now, even the school district had to agree, “at least partially undermines the district court’s reasoning” on the mother’s free exercise and due process claims. The federal appeals panel vacated the dismissal on that basis.
The case now returns to the district court, which must consider whether Mirabelli‘s strict scrutiny framework applies—and if so, whether the school’s policy can survive it.
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