Appeals court pauses, for now, ruling that said teachers can tell parents their child may be transgender

A federal appeals court has temporarily paused enforcement of a San Diego federal judge’s ruling that had cleared the way for school staff to tell parents about possible changes to their child’s gender presentation without the student’s consent.

The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals granted a short-term administrative stay of the ruling but has not yet decided whether to grant a longer-term stay pending an appeal. It’s expected to rule on that next week.

The case, Mirabelli v. Olson, began in 2023 when two Escondido Union School District teachers sued over the district’s policy, based on state guidance at the time, prohibiting employees from disclosing what it called a student’s transgender or gender-nonconforming status absent the student’s consent.

The state has said that doing this risks outing a student who may be transgender or gender-nonconforming to their parents, creating an unsafe school environment and violating state privacy and non-discrimination laws.

But Judge Roger Benitez ruled last week in favor of the plaintiffs in the class-action lawsuit. He said parents have a constitutional right, as part of their rights to raise and care for their children, to know about their child’s gender presentation, and that they deserve to know if their child is gender nonconforming.