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Supreme Court Rules on Parents’ Religious Freedom in LGBTQ School Book Opt-Out Case
Daily Signal ^ | 06/27/2025 | Tyler O'Neil

Posted on 06/27/2025 8:11:24 AM PDT by DFG

The Supreme Court upheld the religious freedom of Maryland parents who challenged a school district policy that prevented them from opting their children out of lessons involving LGBTQ books.

The court ruled, 6-3, that the Maryland parents were entitled to a preliminary injunction.

The case, Mahmoud v. Taylor, involved Maryland parents of various faith backgrounds—Protestant, Catholic, Jewish, and Muslim—asking the court for a temporary injunction, allowing them to opt their kids out of instruction that utilize LGBTQ books that Montgomery County Public Schools has mandated schools teach.

Although Maryland law requires schools to allow parents to opt their children out of “all sexuality instruction” and to provide advanced notice for such lessons, the policy excluded any opt-out right. The school district initially granted the opt-out but later revoked it, saying that too many parents requested to opt out and that the LGBTQ books are exempt from the law because they are taught as literature. The school district defended the policy as advancing the cause of inclusion.

“These books are, in fact, teaching explicit sexual orientation and gender identity issues as early as pre-K,” Will Haun, senior counsel at the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, previously told The Daily Signal. The associated reading instructions he said, “Require teachers to make dismissive statements about a student’s religious beliefs, to shame children who disagree, and to teach as facts things that some would not agree are facts.”

The Pride storybooks include selections such as “My Rainbow,” which tells the story of a mother who creates a rainbow-colored wig for a child the book presents as “transgender.”

“Born Ready: The True Story of a Boy Named Penelope” recounts the tale of a biological girl who identifies as a boy and who struggles to convince the world that she is male.

“Prince & Knight” and “Love, Violet” tell same-sex romance stories.

During a Montgomery County school board meeting, board member Lynne Harris said, “Because saying that a kindergartener can’t be present when you read a book about a rainbow unicorn because it offends your religious rights or your family values or your core beliefs is just telling that kid, ‘Here’s another reason to hate another person.’”

Harris also insisted that “transgender, LGBTQ individuals are not an ideology, they’re a reality.”


TOPICS: Politics
KEYWORDS: demagogicparty; lawfare; maga; scotus

1 posted on 06/27/2025 8:11:24 AM PDT by DFG
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To: DFG

More winning.


2 posted on 06/27/2025 8:12:24 AM PDT by No name given ( Anonymous is who you’ll know me as)
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To: DFG

6-3 for sanity, again. Those 3 chicks are bat-crap crazy.


3 posted on 06/27/2025 8:12:33 AM PDT by vpintheak (Screw the ChiComms! America first!)
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To: vpintheak
Those 3 chicks are bat-crap crazy.

Alito's comments pretty much made that obvious.

4 posted on 06/27/2025 8:14:13 AM PDT by 1Old Pro
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To: DFG

First, abolish public “education “
If they can’t then have an “opt in” program. Guarantee no one will opt in.


5 posted on 06/27/2025 8:17:51 AM PDT by mikelets456
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To: mikelets456

Perfect.


6 posted on 06/27/2025 8:19:46 AM PDT by HANG THE EXPENSE (Life's tough.It's tougher when you're stupid.)
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To: vpintheak
Those 3 chicks are bat-crap crazy.

and care nothing for the law.

7 posted on 06/27/2025 8:21:12 AM PDT by Skooz (Gabba Gabba accept you we accept you one of us Gabba Gabba we accept you we accept you one of us )
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To: vpintheak

Just for the record, ACB has voted right in 7 straight cases, plus wrote the scathing opinion in the national injunction case against Jumpin’ Jackson Brown, in addition to voting right previously on guns, affirmative action, abortion, private sector vax exemptions, Trump immunity, Trump ballot access, SEC, EPA, Chevron, and others.


8 posted on 06/27/2025 8:21:53 AM PDT by LS ("Castles made of sand, fall in the sea . . . eventually." Jimi Hendrix)
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To: DFG
SCOTUS, of course, is at fault for inscribing "gay rights" into the Constitution, which was always going to cause a conflict with the 1st Amendment's guarantee of freedom of religious belief and practice.

This decision is simply an acknowledgment of that conflict because if the unenumerated rights of sexual deviancy are truly Constitutional rights, then the state has the power to suppress religious objections as bigoted.

They can't square that circle and eventually either the 1st Amendment or "gay rights" will have to go.

9 posted on 06/27/2025 8:27:06 AM PDT by pierrem15 ("Massacrez-les, car le seigneur connait les siens" )
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To: DFG

Excellent


10 posted on 06/27/2025 8:27:44 AM PDT by Engraved-on-His-hands
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To: DFG

Predictably Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, and Ketanji Brown Jackson dissented.


11 posted on 06/27/2025 8:36:17 AM PDT by Savage Beast (Nothing inflames unrest in the delusional, and nothing inflames unrest in the evil, like TRUTH.)
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To: vpintheak

Not sure what happened to Barrett. Sane again. And Roberts too. Who scared them straight?


12 posted on 06/27/2025 8:39:11 AM PDT by RinaseaofDs (Imagine what we'll know tomorrow.)
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To: DFG
Harris also insisted that “transgender, LGBTQ individuals are not an ideology, they’re a reality.”

No, they are suffering from a mental disorder.

13 posted on 06/27/2025 8:48:32 AM PDT by Petrosius
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To: DFG

More good news today.


14 posted on 06/27/2025 8:51:01 AM PDT by 9YearLurker
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To: No name given

When kids absent themselves from school for a day, and I’m totally in favor of doing it here, the school loses state money targeted for those kids, at least in some states where public ed is state funded. So if morality and common sense don’t win the day here, maybe economics will.


15 posted on 06/27/2025 11:18:23 AM PDT by DPMD
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To: DFG

Those books (and grooming courses) shouldn’t be in any school to begin with.


16 posted on 06/29/2025 4:17:15 AM PDT by ViLaLuz (2 Chronicles 7:14)
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To: DFG

The court ruled that the parents were entitled to a preliminary injunction.
Doesn’t seem like it’s over


17 posted on 06/29/2025 4:37:09 AM PDT by Palio di Siena (Kralik…..you get the wallet)
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