California parents’ war with state over right to know their kids are trans

Coming to a school board near you: a battle over whether parents have the right to know if their child is identifying as transgender at school.

The fight has now spread to two coasts.

As a legal battle rages in New Jersey over parental rights to know if their child is identifying as transgender in school, a nearly identical scenario is playing out just outside Los Angeles.

It appears certain to be followed by many more, as school boards and districts which want parents to be informed that a child is identifying as transgender face off with state authorities — usually Democrats — who want the opposite.

In the latest case, California Attorney General Rob Bonta, a Democrat, is suing to block Chino Valley Unified School District’s policy to inform parents if their child socially transitions.

The policy, which was passed in July by a vote of 4 to 1, requires employees to notify parents if their children ask to use a different name or pronoun or seek to use bathrooms and programs that don’t align with their birth gender while at school.

In a press conference, Bonta called the policy, “forced outing” adding that it compels the school to tell the parents, “even if the student doesn’t grant them permission to do so.

“And it goes against their expressed wishes, even if the school staff member thinks they may be putting the student in danger,” said, adding that it violated “the privacy rights of LGBTQ+ students.”

But parents who spoke to The Post said there are already child welfare safeguards in place — and the state is targeting Chino to scare off other California districts who have already adopted similar policies or are considering them.

Chino school district, just east of Los Angeles County, includes three towns — Chino, Chino Hills and parts of Ontario — and has more than 26,000 students from K to 12.

“I can’t fathom the idea of not wanting to tell parents what is going on with their children,” Nicole Vicario told The Post. “To put it in kids’ heads that that you don’t have to tell parents things? It’s causing a wedge between students and parents. But we want strong relationships in families.”

The mother of eight who grew up in Chino has three children still in the district and up until recently, she worked there as a school secretary for 12 years.

She noted that school employees are already mandated reporters, meaning they have to tell the state’s child protective services if children are in danger at home.

“If a kid says ‘I don’t feel safe at home,’ we have to file a report. There’s already protections in place for kids who feel like they are in danger at home,” said Vicario.

Sonia Singh, whose 10-year-old son attends school in the district said she feels the state’s lawsuit is counter to every rule already in place.

“My kid bumped his head with another kid on the basketball court during recess. I got a call immediately saying, ‘he says he’s fine and he’s ready to go back to class, but I have to notify you’,” said Singh. “But if my child says he’s a girl, I can’t know. This makes zero sense.”

The district is no outlier in the country.

Since 2020’s Covid lockdowns, there has been a sweeping movement across the nation advocating for greater parental involvement in public education.

Parents fought for schools to reopen, railed against mask and vaccine mandates, and opposed critical race theory in curricula.

Such a groundswell helped Republican Glenn Youngkin win the Virginia governor’s race in 2021 and led to turnover at local and school board elections.

The Covid fallout galvanized a crop of Chino mothers to question the district’s direction throughout the pandemic.

Sonja Shaw, a fitness trainer and mother of two teens, said she and other parents felt ignored by the previous school board as they asked questions and sought accountability.

It spurred the political newbie to run for the board.

She defeated an incumbent, attorney Christina Gagnier, and became board president in January.

Shaw said the adoption of the new policy was simple. “It was the first time in many years that our district did something that parents were voicing support for.”

During the packed July meeting when the vote took place, Vacario called the atmosphere “tense” but stepped up to the microphone, saying, “We are no longer allowing the village to raise our children,” as applause broke out.

Vicario said that as a school secretary she had had a front row seat to some of the ways the schools were blocking out parents, including training sessions on dealing with transgender students.

“If they were identifying as a different name, there was a space in the system that said, “alias’,” she said.

She recalled speaking to a mother of one such kid and mistakenly calling the student by their school ‘alias’ but correcting herself when she realized she was reading the wrong box.

“It felt duplicitous. It made me feel a little loony myself,” she said.

In his lawsuit, the attorney general said the board was motivated “to create and harbor animosity, discrimination, and prejudice towards transgender and gender-nonconforming students.”

Trans rights groups say LBGTQ youth are especially susceptible to suicide — and should be protected from forcible outing.

But parents told The Post they think the opposite: that their involvement keeps children safe.

Misty Startup, a nurse and mother of six told The Post, “People say we have blood on our hands but parent involvement decreases suicide.

“Where are the studies for the opposing view? No one says, ‘we’ve kept a secret from the family and now they haven’t committed suicide because the parents were kept in the dark.’”

Last month, parental rights advocates saw a huge win in California after the Spreckels Union School District in Monterey County paid $100,000 to a mother who sued claiming the school “socially transitioned” her then 11-year-old daughter to a boy without her knowledge or consent.

The mother, Jessica Konen said her daughter now re-identifies as a girl, and she vowed to keep fighting telling Fox News that schools, “need to understand their place, and they need to stay in their place.”

Singh said Konen’s win is not only a victory for parents, but it’s also a harbinger of things to come if family notification is not required.

“This case is proving to everyone that this is what will continue to happen [if parents aren’t informed],” she said. “The district didn’t take it any further because they knew they were going to have to pay out a lot more money.”

Singh said she and other parents have been branded crazy right-wing Christians and pawns of “Moms for Liberty,” a conservative education advocacy group with chapters across the nation.

But she said: “I am Sikh. My family is from India. I am just a parent who cares. If you have a child dealing with gender dysphoria, that to me is mental and that is medical. If it is medical, a parent needs to be made aware.”

Gagnier, the ousted board chair, told Vice that Moms for Liberty’s handiwork could be seen behind the new wave of parents who voted her out.

“In our community, a group of parents emerged who other board members had no idea who they were, they were not parents that were immediately identified by our school-side administrators or others,” she told the outlet.

Shaw, who was endorsed by the group, acknowledges researching their political resources, among other information but denies any ties to them.

“We received no money, no guidance, no playbook. As parents we just wanted a voice,” said Shaw, who mostly credits California Assemblyman Philip Chen, a Republican, and his chief of staff for staff giving them “invaluable advice.”

Singh predicts the legal fight with the attorney general is raising awareness among other, once-dormant, parents, and will have political ramifications.

“It was a miscalculation on their part. They blew it. There’s not many parents that are going to be okay with this,” said Singh.

“Most parents just want their kids to be academically and socially successful. We want to go back to basics.”