A federal court has ruled that a New Hampshire school district acted “reasonably” in preventing some parents from protesting transgender athletes at a high school soccer game.
U.S. District Court Judge Steven McAuliffe ruled on Monday that the “narrow, plausibly inoffensive” intentions of the protesting parents were not First Amendment-protected speech, as adults attending a high school athletic event could not act in a way that would be demeaning to students.
“While plaintiffs may very well have never intended to communicate a demeaning or harassing message directed at Parker Tirrell or any other transgender students, the symbols and posters they displayed were fully capable of conveying such a message,” the judge wrote. “And, that broader messaging is what the school authorities reasonably understood and appropriately tried to prevent.”
“The broader and more demeaning/harassing message the School District understood plaintiffs’ ‘XX’ symbols to convey was, in context, entirely reasonable,” McAuliffe added.
Kyle Fellers, Anthony Foote, Nicole Foote and Eldon Rash filed the federal lawsuit against the Bow School District last year after they were banned from attending a Bow High School girls’ soccer game in September. The adults had worn pink-colored “XX” wristbands during a game where Parker Tirrell, a transgender athlete who is now 16, played on the opposing team.
Bow and Dunbarton School Districts Superintendent Marcy Kelley had issued a notice of trespass against them, prompting the lawsuit in which the parents contended their First Amendment rights were violated.
“While the no-trespass orders have since expired, they asked the judge to allow them to carry signs and wear the wristbands featuring the symbol for female chromosomes at school events while the case proceeds,” Fox News reported.
However, McAuliffe, a President George H. W. Bush appointee, sided with the school district, saying the adults can display their signs and items outside of Bow High School-sponsored activities. Tirrell, of Plymouth Regional High School, and Iris Turmelle of Pembroke continue to play on girls’ sports teams while the current state law on transgender athletes in New Hampshire continues to be challenged.
“This case presents an increasingly common, and commonly difficult constitutional problem: When may public school authorities limit symbolic speech during school athletic contests to protect students from perceived harm?” wrote McAuliffe.
Attorney Del Kolde with the Institute for Free Speech, representing the parents, wholly disagreed with the judge’s decision.
“This was adult speech in a limited public forum, which enjoys greater First Amendment protection than student speech in the classroom,” he said in a statement. “Bow School District officials were obviously discriminating based on viewpoint because they perceived the XX wristbands to be ‘trans-exclusionary’.”
