As AFN has reported, Jewish, Catholic, and Muslim parents in Montgomery County want to pull their elementary age children from classes that use books featuring LGBTQ characters.
The parents lost their case at the federal district and at the appeals court, but they maintain that subjecting their children to lessons that go against their religious beliefs is a violation of their First Amendment rights. "It's not even just faith; if it goes against what they should not be learning at the proper age, we should have the choice to take them out of that curriculum," Dagmawi Lakew, an Ethiopian Orthodox Christian and father of several children in the Montgomery County school district, told The Daily Signal in 2023.
Bethany Mandel is a mother and writer in Montgomery County. Though she is not involved in the case, she has been following the proceedings and was "thrilled" to see the Supreme Court to take up the issue. "I know a lot of these parents. The district court decision that came out in Maryland was really disappointing for them because they felt like they were in an adversarial relationship with their children's school and teachers and principals," Mandel accounts.
"A lot of these parents are immigrants," she continues. "They don't have the luxury or the privilege of homeschooling or sending them to private, and so they really felt like they were being victimized by the education system."
A date for oral argument has not been set, but Mandel says she is "so glad" that these parents will have a chance to make their case outside of the state of Maryland, "which is not always the sanest place," and have a chance of saving their kids' future in the public education system.
She adds that the Supreme Court's decision in this case, Mahmoud v. Taylor, will impact more than just parents in Montgomery County. "Cramming down controversial gender ideology on three-year-olds without their parents' permission is an affront to our nation's traditions, parental rights, and basic human decency," Becket Vice President Eric Baxter asserts. "The Court must make clear: parents, not the state, should be the ones deciding how and when to introduce their children to sensitive issues about gender and sexuality."
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