DOJ sues Kansas school district over transgender student guidelines and parental consent

In what it called “a first-of-its-kind lawsuit,” the Justice Department has sued a school district in Kansas over its guidelines on student gender identity and assisting transgender students.

The lawsuit, filed Monday, is the latest escalation from the Trump administration targeting school districts for policies or guidelines to accommodate transgender students in academic settings.

The Justice Department said it was seeking to stop the Kansas City, Kansas, public school district from violating federal law by “facilitating secret ‘gender transitions’ for children at school without their parents’ knowledge or consent.”

“Parental rights are paramount in the operation of America’s public schools, and Kansas City, Kansas Public Schools does not know children better than their own parents,” Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon, of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, said in a statement. “The Department will not tolerate school districts playing fast and loose with federal law in the service of radical gender ideology.”

The complaint says district guidelines violated the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) and the Protection of Pupil Rights Amendment (PPRA), which allow parents to view students’ educational records and threaten loss of federal funding for failing to comply.

The district is at risk of losing nearly…

Original source: https://www.nbcnews.com/health