The State of California launched a civil rights investigation Friday of a local school district that dared to adopt a policy requiring schools to notify parents if children want to change their gender, escalating a fight by Gov. Gavin Newsom’s (D) administration.
As Breitbart News reported last month, the Chino Valley Unified School District in Riverside County enacted the policy by a 4-1 vote, with the enthusiastic support of parents, and over the opposition of members of Gavin Newsom’s state government. One state official, Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond, spoke in person at the meeting and was escorted out by security for disruptive conduct. The state is continuing the fight by launching a civil rights investigation of the school district.
Attorney General Rob Bonta announced the probe Friday, claiming the policy infringes “on students’ civil and privacy rights and educational opportunities” and that it exposes them to “trauma, harassment, bullying, and … violence and threats of violence.”
Assemblyman Rob Bonta, D-Oakland, second from left, flanked by California Gov. Gavin Newsom, center, and other lawmakers, discusses his measure that will ban the use of for-profit, private detention facilities, Friday, Oct. 11, 2019,. at the Capitol in Sacramento, Calif. Bonta’s measure, AB32, which includes those detentions facilities the federal government uses for immigrants awaiting deportation hearings, was one of more than a measures signed by Newsom Friday. (AP Photo/Rich Pedroncelli)
However, as school board president Sonja Shaw told Breitbart News in an interview last month, there is no law that allows the state to prevent a school district from adopting a parental notification policy — a step that she described as common sense.
Newsom and his array of state officials are attempting to pressure local school boards to fall in line with the state’s curriculum on LGBTQ+ issues. However, a recent poll showed that 84% of California voters support parental notification policies in schools.
Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of the new biography, Rhoda: ‘Comrade Kadalie, You Are Out of Order’. He is also the author of the recent e-book, Neither Free nor Fair: The 2020 U.S. Presidential Election. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.
