Supreme Court order against California law allows schools to out transgender students to parents

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Trans pride flags flutter in the wind at a gathering to celebrate International Transgender Day of Visibility, March 31, 2017 at the Edward R. Roybal Federal Building in Los Angeles, California. International Transgender Day of Visibility is dedicate

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WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court on Monday blocked a California law that bans schools from telling parents if their child identifies as transgender or changes their pronouns without first getting the student's approval.

The court's order granted an emergency appeal from a conservative legal group.

California's transgender students

What we know:

Governor Gavin Newsom passed Assembly Bill 1955 in 2024, but the new court ruling now allows for schools to notify children's' parents if they identify as transgender or change their pronouns, without first getting the student's approval.

Catholic groups represented by the Thomas More Society, a conservative Catholic law firm, say California's law caused schools to mislead them and, as the Associated Press reports, "secretly facilitate the children's social transition despite their objections."

The Thomas More Society called the decision "the most significant parental rights ruling in a generation."

The state of California had argued that students had a right to privacy regarding their gender expression, especially if they feared rejection from their families.

The high court majority, though, sided with the parents and reinstated a lower-court order blocking the law and school policies while the case continues to play out.

"The parents who assert a free exercise claim have sincere religious beliefs about sex and gender, and they feel a religious obligation to raise their children in accordance with those beliefs. California’s policies violate those beliefs," the majority wrote in an unsigned order.

The court's three liberal justices publicly dissented, saying the case is still working its way through lower courts and there was no need to step in now. "If nothing else, this Court owes it to a sovereign State to avoid throwing over its policies in a slapdash way, if the Court can provide normal procedures. And throwing over a State's policy is what the Court does today," Justice Elena Kagan wrote.

What about other states?

The California order comes months after the court upheld state bans on gender-identity-related healthcare for minors. The justices also seem to be leaning toward allowing states to ban transgender athletes from playing on girls sports teams.

The AP reports the high court rebuffed a similar case in Wisconsin in December, but noted three of its conservative justices would have heard the case.

The justices have been weighing whether to hear arguments in cases out of states like Massachusetts and Florida filed by other parents who say schools facilitated social transition without informing them.

Justice Samuel Alito called the school policies "an issue of great and growing national importance."

The Trump administration, meanwhile, found in January that California's policies violated parents' right to access their children's education records. The Justice Department also sued after determining the states' transgender athlete policies violate federal civil rights law.

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