The Supreme Court has taken up a variety of cases in the legal battle over transgender rights, from state bans on transgender medical procedures for children to bans on biological men playing in women’s sports, but the next issue the high court could take up is whether schools can hide students’ gender transitions from their parents.
As the Supreme Court prepares to hear challenges to state laws limiting women’s sports to biological women, advocates are optimistic the justices will ultimately agree to take up a case looking at policies in various schools nationwide that restrict school officials from telling parents about their student’s gender identity at school.
John Bursch, senior counsel for the conservative law firm Alliance Defending Freedom, told the Washington Examiner that the policies allowing for “secret social transitions at public schools” are the “most critical issue” that he hopes the Supreme Court will take up as the next front in the legal war over trans policies.
The policies involve school officials changing the name and pronouns of a child who has adopted a new gender identity and appearance at school while not informing, and, in several cases, intentionally hiding, that gender transition from the student’s parents.
“That can cause incredible harm to those young people, and parents have a right to know when that’s happening and to not have the schools interfere in the mental health treatment that they’re giving their their children,” Bursch said.
Supreme Court reviewing a pair of petitions on the matter
The justices are reviewing a pair of petitions that could bring the issue of these secret gender transitions before the Supreme Court: Littlejohn v. School Board of Leon County and Foote v. Ludlow School Committee.
The Littlejohn case involves the parents of a 13-year-old daughter, labeled A.G. in court filings, for whom they say a Florida school devised a secret “gender support” plan and advised staff not to inform the parents about it.
“They labeled A.G. ‘nonbinary’; required all teachers and staff to refer to her using they/them pronouns, updated internal records to reflect her ‘new’ name, asked her if she was ‘comfortable’ sharing bathrooms and bedrooms with males, and banned anyone from telling her parents. They did all this without even asking A.G. if she wanted her parents to be involved,” the petition to the high court reads.
“When the Littlejohns found out and asked the school to stop, the school refused,” the petition continued. “When the Littlejohns asked to participate, the school said they had no right. And when the Littlejohns asked for records of the meetings with their daughter, the school said those records were private.”
With the Foote case, parents Stephen Foote and Marissa Silvestri claim school officials in Massachusetts secretly gender-transitioned their daughter during school hours and actively concealed the middle-school girl’s use of a different name, pronouns, and bathroom facilities from her parents.
“School officials actively concealed their activities by using B.F.’s real name and pronouns when communicating with Petitioners but using her male name and nonbinary pronouns at school,” the petition to the high court alleged. “The school counselor instructed middle-school staff that they should not tell Petitioners about their daughter’s use of a male name.”
In both cases, the parents have asked the high court to strike down the secretive gender transition policies as a violation of the parents’ constitutional rights. The Foote petition has been discussed by the justices at four consecutive closed-door conferences, while the Littlejohn case is expected to be discussed at a conference in the coming weeks. A decision on whether the high court takes up the Foote case could come as soon as Monday.
Among the other cases making their way through lower federal courts is a dispute over California’s statewide school policy hiding gender transitions from parents. Teachers Elizabeth Mirabelli and Lori West sued over the policy, and a federal district judge granted an injunction halting the policy statewide late last month. The victory was short-lived, however, as a federal appeals court panel halted the injunction pending an appeal.
The two teachers’ lawyers appealed the stay pending appeal to the Supreme Court’s emergency docket, asking for the permanent injunction against the state to remain in place while the appeal proceeds. The filing to the high court’s emergency docket could give the justices an early chance to indicate how they feel about the matter.
“There are literally dozens of lawsuits pending around the country involving parents who are asserting their constitutional right to be able to direct their child’s mental health treatment, and it’s coming to a head very quickly,” Bursch said.
Justices have previously shown interest in addressing the issue
In October 2025, the high court declined to take up a case over a Colorado middle school that was allegedly hiding the promotion of gender ideology to students, with officials at the school giving prizes to students who “came out” as trans at Gender and Sexualities Alliance meetings. While the justices seemingly unanimously rejected reviewing the case, a trio of justices said in a statement on the decision that they wanted to take up a case on the matter in the future.
“I remain concerned that some federal courts are ‘tempt[ed]’ to avoid confronting a ‘particularly contentious constitutional questio[n]’: whether a school district violates parents’ fundamental rights ‘when, without parental knowledge or consent, it encourages a student to transition to a new gender or assists in that process,’” Justice Samuel Alito wrote, joined by Justices Clarence Thomas and Neil Gorsuch.
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“The troubling—and tragic—allegations in this case underscore the ‘great and growing national importance’ of the question that these parent petitioners present,’” Alito added.
When the high court rejected reviewing a petition in a similar case involving a policy in a Wisconsin school district last month, Justices Thomas, Alito, and Brett Kavanaugh said they would have taken it. For the Supreme Court to take up a case, only four of the nine justices need to grant the petition for review.
