Two stories topping the news this morning may seem unconnected, but on closer examination, have more in common than you may think.
The first is the unilateral announcement by the Obama administration that every school in America that accepts federal dollars must now allow any student of any gender into any restroom or locker room. They couch it in terms of the transgender debate, then nullify the prerequisite that a student actually be transgender by saying that it depends on how the student self-identifies rather than by any physically identifiable characteristic. This is insanity! But insanity seems to be par for the course these days when it comes to the government. Unless we think these decrees are without consequences, we need only look at the mounting evidence that sexual predators use transgender laws as an excuse to gain access to women’s facilities.
According to a recent Breitbart article, a man in Seattle undressed in a woman’s locker room citing a new state rule that allows people to use facilities based on gender identity. In Virginia, a man dressed as a woman was arrested after filming women in adjacent restroom stalls. In Palmdale, California, a man dressed as a woman was arrested after secretly videotaping women in department store restrooms. In Toronto, a man claimed to be transgender to gain access to two women’s shelters where he allegedly preyed on women. He was subsequently arrested and declared by a judge to be a dangerous offender. And in another story out of Canada, the University of Toronto dumped its transgender bathroom policy after receiving too many complaints of peeping incidents by male students in female bathrooms. And that’s just the beginning. Similar stories come to us from Smyrna, Tennessee; San Jose, California; Fullerton, California; Hamilton Township, New Jersey; Colfax, Washington; and Miami, Florida, just to name a few.
In another story, seemingly disconnected, but maybe not, we have received word that the Montana Department of Revenue will appeal their loss in a school choice case, to the Montana Supreme Court. As you recall, the 2015 legislature passed a tax credit scholarship bill making Montana the 43rd state to enact some form of school choice. The Department of Revenue then usurped the legislature’s power and banned faith-based schools from participating. The Attorney General told the Department of Revenue that their actions were indefensible, and that if they were sued, they were on their own. Well, our side did sue, both in state and federal court. We expected a quick victory because this particular point of law has been litigated all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court and we have won.
This is blatant viewpoint discrimination and cannot be allowed to stand. As expected, we won in State District Court, and now the department is wasting taxpayer dollars by filing an appeal. We have always claimed that school choice is necessary so that struggling students have options. But the push to allow boys into girls’ bathrooms and locker rooms has taken the need for school choice to a whole new level. The debate is no longer purely about academics; it’s also becoming a matter of public safety. And we predict a mass exodus from the public schools if the government insists upon using our children as lab rats in some politically correct Machiavellian experiment.
It’s time for parents and school boards across the U.S. to rise up and say NO—-NO to ill-conceived liberal policy, NO to heavy-handed bureaucrats taking us by decree in a direction we don’t want to go, NO to the victimization of women, and YES to a return to common sense before we sacrifice an entire generation on the altar of political correctness.
