A school district’s LGBTQ affinity group violated the First Amendment by blocking a journalist on social media amid a heated debate about parents’ right to opt their children out of hearing teachers read LGBTQ-themed books, a federal judge ruled last week.
Atheist, Christian, Jewish, Muslim, and other parents demanded the right to opt out of a 2022 LGBTQ book curriculum for pre-K through fifth grades in Montgomery County Public Schools, a suburban Maryland school district just outside the nation’s capital.
The Montgomery County school district refused to grant the right to opt out, and the parents sued. They have appealed the lawsuit all the way up to the Supreme Court.
Journalist and mother Bethany Mandel spoke out against the policy, often engaging with an LGBTQ social media account controlled by Montgomery County Public Schools staff named “@MCPS_StaffPRIDE.”
The school district’s website links to a “Staff Affinity Page,” which links to the social media account. This account “blocked” Mandel on X (the platform formerly known as Twitter), and she sued, claiming the action violates her First Amendment rights.
In her ruling last week, U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis,........