Oklahoma education board defers decision on preferred pronoun policy at center of new lawsuit

Just hours after being sued over the issue, the Oklahoma State Board of Education on Thursday deferred voting on a permanent rule change that would prohibit school districts and local schools from “altering sex or gender designations in past student records without authorization from the State Board of Education.”

The board approved a similar temporary rule on Sept. 28, and a public hearing was held Monday. According to a rule impact statement on the Oklahoma State Department of Education's website, the purpose of the rule change “is to prevent alteration of sex or gender designations in historical school records. The State Department of Education has received notice that some students changing their sex or gender with parental consent are also seeking to remove prior records that accurately reflect their sex or gender during prior years. The rule will provide districts with clear authority to protect their historical records.”

The proposed rule clearly specifies "past" and "historical" records. State schools Superintendent Ryan Walters' spokesperson Dan Isett said he was uncertain what the policy was on current school records and those going forward.

The item was on the agenda for Thursday’s board meeting. The Education Department's general counsel, Bryan Cleveland, had said he would recommend it as a permanent rule, but the board’s new attorney, Cara Nicklas, asked for more time to review public comment on the proposal, so the item was deferred to January. The temporary rule remains in place until then, unless a judge rules otherwise.

Student files lawsuit against Ryan Walters over proposed pronoun rule

Earlier Thursday, the Oklahoma Equality Law Center and the Oklahoma Appleseed Center for Law and Justice announced they filed a lawsuit in Cleveland County District Court against Walters and the entire board on behalf of a Moore Public Schools student – referred to in the lawsuit as “J. Doe” – whose request to change their pronouns in school records was unanimously denied by the board during its October meeting.

During that meeting, the board rejected requests from the Moore and Cushing school districts concerning pronoun changes after those districts had received court orders to make those changes. Walters dismissed the court orders out of hand and the state Education Department’s general counsel called the orders illegal.

Board members were served with the lawsuit at 11 a.m., about two hours before the start of their meeting Thursday, said Marnie Fernandez, of the Oklahoma Equality Law Center.

Neither Walters nor board members commented on the lawsuit during the meeting, but while it was in progress, Walters issued a statement through a spokesman: “Radical gender theory has led some people to fight the obvious, God-given biological nature of human beings: that there are two genders, male and female,” Walters said. “Our pronoun policy aligns with common sense, truth, and reality and protects schools and teachers from unfounded accusations of discrimination. This frivolous lawsuit, propped up by the extreme left, is an unserious distraction from the very serious business of improving Oklahoma schools for all our students.”

In the lawsuit, the plaintiffs asked a judge to declare the rule invalid “as beyond the scope of the grant of rulemaking authority by the Legislature to the Board under Oklahoma Administrative Procedures Act” and asked for a restraining order to prevent the board from adopting the permanent version of the rules, pending the outcome of the litigation.

The lawsuit claims the new rules violate the Oklahoma Administrative Procedures Act. It also claims the rules are a violation of the student’s rights under the Equal Protection clause of the Oklahoma and U.S. constitutions, and gender discrimination rules under Title IX and of the Oklahoma Parents’ Bill of Rights.

The plaintiffs said quotes from Walters and other board members show “malicious intent to discriminate against transgender children.” One Walters remark cited in the lawsuit came in September, when he said changing pronouns "is an absolute assault on our classrooms, on our kids' minds, on Christianity. This is an assault on faith. What they want is for kids to go home and tell their moms and dads ‘we should be able to change our gender, we should be able to talk about transgenderism’ … so this is a war on parents, kids, and faith.”

“Administrative overreach and interference from the state as it relates to raising children in Oklahoma must stop,” said Colleen McCarty, executive director of Oklahoma Appleseed Center for Law and Justice. “This lawsuit sends a strong message that Oklahomans will not tolerate the government interfering with their private family affairs. Parents know what's best for their kids, and we are willing to stand up for that bedrock principle.

She added: “Walters and the State Board have repeatedly denied the existence of transgender students, insisting their genders are merely a fabrication of the ‘woke left.’ This signaling from the Board makes it clear their intent is gender discrimination against our client under Title IX which is supposed to prevent schools and educational bodies from discriminating on the basis of gender.”

This article originally appeared on Oklahoman: Oklahoma school board defers decision on pronoun policy