{"id":155023,"date":"2026-01-29T15:26:08","date_gmt":"2026-01-29T15:26:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/155023\/"},"modified":"2026-01-29T15:26:08","modified_gmt":"2026-01-29T15:26:08","slug":"education-department-says-california-must-allow-schools-to-forcibly-out-trans-students","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/155023\/","title":{"rendered":"Education Department says California must allow schools to forcibly out trans students"},"content":{"rendered":"

The U.S. Department of Education\u2019s (ED) Student Privacy Policy Office (SPPO) accused the California Department of Education (CDE) of violating the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) \u2014 a federal law granting parents the right to access their child\u2019s education records \u2014 by prohibiting schools districts from notifying parents if their child requests to use\u00a0pronouns<\/a>\u00a0and facilities different from the sex they were assigned at birth.<\/p>\n

In a statement<\/a> released by Education Secretary Linda McMahon on Wednesday, she accused CDE of \u201cegregiously\u201d abusing its authority by \u201cpressuring school officials to withhold information about students\u2019 so-called \u2018gender transitions\u2019 from their parents.\u201d <\/p>\n

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\u201cChildren do not belong to the State\u2014they belong to families,\u201d she added. \u201cWe will use every available mechanism to hold California accountable for these practices and restore parental rights.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

The statement specifically mentions the SAFETY Act<\/a> \u2014 the Support Academic Futures & Educators for Today\u2019s Youth\u00a0law \u2014 a 2024 law that prohibits forced outing \u201cparental notification\u201d policies in school districts. The law protects teachers and administrators from retaliation if they choose not to follow district directives to out queer kids to their parents. It also funds resources for parents and families of queer students to facilitate supportive conversations about their identities on terms that make the children feel safe and respected.<\/p>\n

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McMahon accused CDE of sharing \u201cstrategies to target minors and conceal information about children from their own families,\u201d claiming the CDE put\u00a0at least 300 students on \u201cGender Support Plans,\u201d affirming students\u2019 gender identities and personal pronoun use \u201cwithout parental consent or knowledge.\u201d<\/p>\n

The ED\u2019s statement notes that when the school board of California\u2019s Chino Valley Unified School District adopted a policy in July 2023 to forcibly out trans students to their parents, California State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond and California Attorney General Rob Bonta acted swiftly to stop it, arguing that students have a constitutional right to privacy from their parents in California and that \u201ctransgender students may suffer from being \u2018outed\u2019 to their parents against their will.\u201d Bonta sued Chino Valley and other districts, saying these forced outing policies violated the California Constitution and other state laws.\u00a0A judge eventually ruled against the Chino Valley district.<\/p>\n

The ED\u2019s statement said that the SPPO offered CDE \u201cthe opportunity to voluntarily resolve its FERPA violations\u201d by telling school districts that\u00a0parent must be given access to their student\u2019s education records, including any pronoun changes, upon request. If California doesn\u2019t comply, it risks losing the $8 billion in annual education funding it receives from the federal government.<\/p>\n

A spokesperson for Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) said in 2024<\/a> that \u201cparents continue to have full, guaranteed access to their student\u2019s education records as required by federal law,\u201d adding, \u201cCalifornia law ensures minors can\u2019t legally change their name or gender without parental consent, and parents continue to have guaranteed and full access to their student\u2019s educational records consistent with federal law.\u201d<\/p>\n

At least eight red states have passed legislation mandating schools out trans students to their parents, while another five have passed laws promoting parental notification, according to the\u00a0Movement Advanced Project<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Subscribe to the\u00a0LGBTQ Nation newsletter<\/a>\u00a0and be the first to know about the latest headlines shaping LGBTQ+ communities worldwide.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The U.S. Department of Education\u2019s (ED) Student Privacy Policy Office (SPPO) accused the California Department of Education (CDE)…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":155024,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[7,9,8,19442,76098,76099,457,5037,76097,41245,5767,76100,76101],"class_list":["post-155023","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-california","tag-california","tag-california-headlines","tag-california-news","tag-department-of-education","tag-forced-outing","tag-forced-outing-ban","tag-gavin-newsom","tag-gov-gavin-newsom","tag-law-policy","tag-linda-mcmahon","tag-post","tag-safety-act","tag-secretary-of-education"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/155023","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=155023"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/155023\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/155024"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=155023"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=155023"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=155023"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}