A federal judge issued an order blocking some of Iowa’s anti-LGBTQ education laws.
The provisions of the law, enacted by Gov. Kim Reynolds in May 2023, include the prohibition of books that contain “explanations or visual depictions of sexual conduct,” except for approved scientific or healthy class texts, or religious texts such as the Bible. The law prohibits “programs, curriculum, testing, surveys, surveys, promotions or guidance” referring to sexual orientation or gender identity in K-6 classrooms.
Under the law, teachers and other school staff are prohibited from creating “accommodation facilities intended to affirm the gender identity of students” without first obtaining written permission from the students’ parents or legal guardians.
Teachers should also inform parents whether students are asked to use names or pronouns that do not match the sex assigned at birth.
The law was scheduled to come into effect on January 1, 2024, but the ACLU of Iowa and Lambda Laws filed a lawsuit on behalf of seven students in their LGBTQ nonprofit Iowa Safe Schools and seven Iowa students and their families who allegedly affected by the law.
Publishing Giant Penguin Random House filed another lawsuit on behalf of the four authors, whose works were censored under the ban. The state’s largest teachers’ union, the author’s guild, and four major publishers took part in the lawsuit.
In December 2023, US District Judge Stephen Locker for the Southern District of Iowa merged the two cases. Locher later ruled that this prohibition provision in the law is likely to violate the First Amendment, and that the ban on LGBTQ-related content in classrooms is unconstitutional, ambiguous and overloaded.
The state appealed the decision, and the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals lifted the injunction and ordered lower courts to apply the new U.S. Supreme Court case when analyzing the parties’ arguments.
In March, Rocher issued a temporary injunction to stop the state from enforcing the ban. On May 15, he issued a preliminary injunction allowing other provisions to be put into effect, while blocking parts of the law, reporting Little Village magazine.
Locher supported the prohibition of the law on forced lessons or instruction for K-6 students, including detailed explanations or normative views about “gender identity” or “sexual orientation.”
“It doesn’t matter whether lessons or instruction revolve around cisgender or transgender identity, or straight or gay sexual orientation,” Roche writes. “Everything is prohibited.”
However, he discovered that teachers should not be punished for accidental, neutral references to sexual orientation or gender identity that were made within the context of a larger lesson. He also found that books could be assigned and given lessons to K-6 students, including character and gender identity (cisgender or transgender) and sexual orientation (gay or straight), unless the teacher was the main focus of the lesson.
Locher warned that the provisions of the law prohibiting “programs” related to gender identity are very broad and prohibiting what constitutes a “prohibition of law” related to gender identity, under the neutral reading of the law, means other classroom or extracurricular activities that recognize and approve gender identity.
Locher blocked provisions in the law prohibiting gender and gender alliances and other student groups related to gender identity and sexual orientation, and said students must be allowed to join such groups if they wished.
Locher said the law has urged some school districts to remove LGBTQ symbols such as pride flags and safe space stickers. Some teachers need not only same-sex partners in the student’s ears. Locher found that such a ban violated the initial amendment.
Locher felt unconstitutional and ambiguous because he narrowed down the provisions of the law that required written permission from parents before detaining a student’s gender identity and did not define what constitutes a “accommodation.”
However, he maintained the provisions of the “parental notice” of the law, and requested that teachers notify parents if they request that their children be dealt with using names or pronouns that do not match those listed in their official school records.
Locher concluded that both the student and teacher plaintiffs could face “irreparable harm” if they were allowed to ensure that the provisions he blocked were in effect.
“The ruling acknowledges that students and teachers in Iowa have experienced real harm from this law,” Nathan Maxwell, senior lawyer at Lambda Legal, said in a statement. “The court agreed with us that latitude was given to the state to determine the school curriculum.
Source: Metro Weekly – www.metroweekly.com
