U.S. Federal Courts
Federal court: No misgendering transgender students on religious grounds
7th Circuit judge issued ruling in Ind. case
The 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled Friday that a public school teacher does not have the right to misgender a transgender student simply because they’re trans. The court found a religious accommodation could not justify the “harm to students and disruption to the learning environment.”
The 3-judge circuit court panel upheld a Jan. 8, 2020, ruling by U.S. District Court Judge Jane Magnus-Stinson from the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Indiana.
The case on behalf of John Kluge, who worked at Brownsburg High School in Brownsburg, Ind., as a music and orchestra teacher from 2014 until May 2018, was brought by the anti-LGBTQ legal group Alliance Defending Freedom, which self labels as a conservative Christian legal advocacy group, but the Southern Poverty Law Center first listed as an anti-LGBTQ hate group in 2016.
WISH in Indianapolis had reported that in court documents Brownsburg faculty during meetings in early 2017 began talking about trans students and “how teachers can encourage and support them.” After that, faculty and staff approached the high school’s principal for direction on how to address trans students.
In May 2017, Kluge and three other teachers presented the principal with a signed letter expressing religious objections to “transgenderism,” asking that faculty and staff not be required to refer to trans students by their preferred pronouns. In the letter, they also said they did not want trans students to be allowed to use the restrooms or locker rooms of their choice.
Later in that May, the Brownsburg Community School Corporation district adopted a policy that required all staff to refer to students by their chosen name listed in the school records. According to court documents, “students could change their first names in PowerSchool if they presented a letter from a parent and a letter from a healthcare professional regarding the need for a name change.”
The policy also allowed trans students to use restrooms of their choice and dress according to the gender with which they identified.
Kluge refused and was told by the high school’s principal that there were only three options: Follow the policy; resign; or be suspended, pending termination. He refused to follow the policy or resign, so he was suspended.
Kluge then compromised and presented district officials with two requested accommodations: First, that he be allowed to refer to all students by their last names only, “like a gym coach;” and second, that he not be responsible for handing out gender specific orchestra uniforms to students. He would treat the class like an “orchestra team” he proposed.
According to the court documents, He agreed that, if a student asked him why he was using last names only, he would not mention his religious objections to using trans students’ first names and would explain, “I’m using last names only because we’re a team, we’re an orchestra team, just like a sports coach says, hey, Smith, hey, Jones. We are one orchestra team working towards a common goal.”
School officials began to receive complaints from the Brownsburg High School Equality Alliance students and parents that Kluge was referring to them by their last names only, was a practice they found insulting and disrespectful.
In addition to the complaints of the school’s LGBTQ students, a student who was not in the Equality Alliance but was in Kluge’s orchestra class and who did not identify as LGBTQ, told school administrators that Kluge’s use of last names made him feel incredibly uncomfortable. The student described Kluge’s practice as very awkward because the student was fairly certain that all the students knew why Kluge had switched to using last names, and that it made the trans students in the orchestra class stand out. The student felt bad for the trans students, and shared with that other students felt this way as well.
The principal met with Kluge in December 2017 and told him using last names only was “creating tension in the students and faculty” and told him it might be good for him to resign at the end of the year.
On Jan. 22, 2018, administrators presented the faculty with a document titled “Transgender Questions.” The document provided policies and guidance for faculty in a question/answer format regarding issues relevant to trans students. Among the questions posed and answers given were the following:
Are we allowed to use the student’s last name only?
We have agreed to this for the 2017–2018 school year, but moving forward it is our expectation the student will be called by the first name listed in PowerSchool.
How do teachers break from their personal biases and beliefs so that we can best serve our students?
We know this is a difficult topic for some staff members, however, when you work in a public school, you sign up to follow the law and the policies/practices of that organization and that might mean following practices that are different than your beliefs
What feedback and information has been received from transgender students?
They appreciate teachers who are accepting and supporting of them. They feel dehumanized by teachers they perceive as not being accepting or who continue to use the wrong pronouns or names. Non-transgender students in classrooms with transgender students have stated
they feel uncomfortable in classrooms where teachers are not accepting. For example, teachers that call students by their last name, don’t use correct pronouns, don’t speak to the studentor acknowledge them, etc.
According to WISH, Kluge responded to the document by asking if he would still be allowed to call the students by their last names only.
In a February meeting, administrators told Kluge he would no longer be allowed to continue that practice, saying the “accommodation was not reasonable.” They went on to discuss whether Kluge would finish the school year or resign mid-year and offered to let him submit his resignation and not process it or tell anyone about it until the end of the school year. Kluge told the court the explanation of the resignation process led him to believe he could turn in a “conditional resignation” that he could later withdraw.
In March, Kluge was once again given the same options: follow the name policy and keep working for the district, resign or be terminated. He was told if he didn’t submit his resignation by May 1, the district would begin the termination process.
On April 30, Kluge emailed the human resources director with a formal resignation and asked that it not be shared with anyone until May 29. In the letter, he said he was resigning because of the district’s name policy and the loss of his accommodation.
By late May Kluge then attempted to withdraw his resignation and accused the district of discrimination based on his religious beliefs. At a June 11, 2018, school board meeting, he asked the board members to not to accept his resignation, and then there was a contentious public comments session as members of the community spoke both for and against his termination. The board approved his resignation.
Not long after he filed suit.
Magnus-Stinson in her ruling noted: Kluge v. Brownsburg Cmty. Sch. Corp., 432 F. Supp. 3d 823, 851 (S.D. Ind. 2020) (“The policy controlled the way in which Mr. Kluge addressed individual students during the course of his employment, but did not otherwise affect his ability to exercise his religion in the remainder of his life. Accordingly, to the extent that the Policy limited his religious exercise, the limitation was not so significant as to render the entire idea of free exercise of religion meaningless, because Mr. Kluge remained free to exercise his religious beliefs at other times and in other places.”)
Magnus-Stinson also concluded that a public school corporation “has an obligation to meet the needs of all of its students, not just a majority of students or the students that were unaware of or unbothered by Mr. Kluge’s practice of using last names only.”
Friday’s appellate court decision is likely to be appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Seventh Circuit ruling upholding U.S. District Court Judge Jane Magnus-Stinson’s ruling:
Puerto Rico
The ‘X’ returns to court
1st Circuit hears case over legal recognition of nonbinary Puerto Ricans
Eight months ago, I wrote about this issue at a time when it had not yet reached the judicial level it faces today. Back then, the conversation moved through administrative decisions, public debate, and political resistance. It was unresolved, but it had not yet reached this point.
That has now changed.
Lambda Legal appeared before the 1st U.S. Court of Appeals in Boston, urging the court to uphold a lower court ruling that requires the government of Puerto Rico to issue birth certificates that accurately reflect the identities of nonbinary individuals. The appeal follows a district court decision that found the denial of such recognition to be a violation of the U.S. Constitution.
This marks a turning point. The issue is no longer theoretical. A court has already determined that unequal treatment exists.
The argument presented by the plaintiffs is grounded in Puerto Rico’s own legal framework. Identity birth certificates are not static historical records. They are functional documents used in everyday life. They are required to access employment, education, and essential services. Their purpose is practical, not symbolic.
Within that framework, the exclusion of nonbinary individuals does not stem from a legal limitation. Puerto Rico already allows gender marker corrections on birth certificates for transgender individuals under the precedent established in Arroyo Gonzalez v. Rosselló Nevares. In addition, the current Civil Code recognizes the existence of identity documents that reflect a person’s lived identity beyond the original birth record.
The issue lies in how the law is applied.
Recognition is granted within specific categories, while those who do not identify within that binary structure remain excluded. That exclusion is now at the center of this case.
Lambda Legal’s position is straightforward. Requiring individuals to carry documents that do not reflect who they are forces them into misrepresentation in essential aspects of daily life. This creates practical barriers, exposes them to scrutiny, and places them in a constant state of vulnerability.
The plaintiffs, who were born in Puerto Rico, have made clear that access to accurate identification is not symbolic. It is a basic condition for moving through the world without contradiction imposed by the state.
The fact that this case is now being addressed in the federal court system adds another layer of significance. This is not a pending policy discussion or a legislative proposal. It is a constitutional question. The analysis is not about political preference, but about rights and equal protection under the law.
This case does not exist in isolation.
It unfolds within a broader context in which debates over identity and rights have increasingly been shaped by the growing influence of conservative perspectives in public policy, both in the United States and in Puerto Rico. At the local level, this influence has been reflected in legislative discussions where religious arguments have begun to intersect with decisions that should be grounded in constitutional principles. That intersection creates tension around the separation of church and state and has direct consequences for access to rights.
Recognizing this context is not an attack on faith or religious practice. It is an acknowledgment that when certain perspectives move into the realm of public authority, they can shape outcomes that affect specific communities.
From within Puerto Rico, this is not a distant debate. It is a lived reality. It is present in the difficulty of presenting identification that does not match one’s identity, and in the consequences that follow in workplaces, schools, and government spaces.
The progression of this case introduces the possibility of change within the applicable legal framework. Not because it resolves every tension surrounding the issue, but because it establishes a legal examination of a practice that has long operated under exclusion.
Eight months ago, the conversation centered on ongoing developments. Today, there is already a judicial finding that identifies a violation of rights. What remains is whether that finding will be upheld on appeal.
That process does not guarantee an immediate outcome, but it shifts the ground.
The debate is no longer theoretical.
It is now before the courts.
Maryland
4th Circuit dismisses lawsuit against Montgomery County schools’ pronoun policy
Substitute teacher Kimberly Polk challenged regulation in 2024
A federal appeals court has ruled Montgomery County Public Schools did not violate a substitute teacher’s constitutional rights when it required her to use students’ preferred pronouns in the classroom.
The 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in a 2-1 decision it released on Jan. 28 ruled against Kimberly Polk.
The policy states that “all students have the right to be referred to by their identified name and/or pronoun.”
“School staff members should address students by the name and pronoun corresponding to the gender identity that is consistently asserted at school,” it reads. “Students are not required to change their permanent student records as described in the next section (e.g., obtain a court-ordered name and/or new birth certificate) as a prerequisite to being addressed by the name and pronoun that corresponds to their identified name. To the extent possible, and consistent with these guidelines, school personnel will make efforts to maintain the confidentiality of the student’s transgender status.”
The Washington Post reported Polk, who became a substitute teacher in Montgomery County in 2021, in November 2022 requested a “religious accommodation, claiming that the policy went against her ‘sincerely held religious beliefs,’ which are ‘based on her understanding of her Christian religion and the Holy Bible.’”
U.S. District Judge Deborah Boardman in January 2025 dismissed Polk’s lawsuit that she filed in federal court in Beltsville. Polk appealed the decision to the 4th Circuit.
U.S. Federal Courts
Federal judge in Md. rules against White House passport policy
Lambda Legal represents transgender, nonbinary people in lawsuit
A federal judge in Maryland on Tuesday ruled in favor of six transgender people who are challenging the Trump-Vance administration’s passport policy.
President Donald Trump once he took office signed an executive order that banned the State Department from issuing passports with “X” gender markers. A memo the Washington Blade obtained directed State Department personnel to “suspend any application where the applicant is seeking to change their sex marker from that defined in the executive order
pending further guidance.”
The Trump-Vance administration only recognizes two genders: male and female.
The lawsuit that Lambda Legal filed in U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland in Baltimore in April alleges the policy “has caused and is causing grave and immediate harm to transgender people like plaintiffs, in violation of their constitutional rights to equal protection.”
Seven trans people — Zander Schlacter, Jill Tran, Lia Hepler-Mackey, David Doe, Robert Roe, Peter Poe, and Kris Koe — filed the lawsuit.
Roe is a U.S. Foreign Service Officer who currently lives in Europe. Lambda Legal, who represents him and the six other plaintiffs, notes Chief Judge George L. Russell III dismissed Roe’s case because the State Department has yet to deny him “an accurate passport.”
“Like every other court that has considered this executive order, the court finds its stated purpose does not serve an important governmental interest that is exceedingly persuasive; further, the discriminatory means employed are not substantially related to the achievement of those objectives,” said Russell in his ruling.
Lambda Legal Counsel Carl Charles described Russell’s decision as “a crucial victory for our clients and transgender people nationwide who have been trapped by this administration’s cruel and discriminatory policy.”
“The court recognized that forcing inaccurate identity documents on transgender Americans causes immediate and irreparable harm,” said Charles in a press release. “Our clients can now travel with dignity and safety while we continue fighting to overturn this discriminatory policy entirely.”
The American Civil Liberties Union earlier this year filed a separate lawsuit against the passport directive on behalf of seven trans and nonbinary people.
A federal judge in Boston in April issued a preliminary junction against it. A three-judge panel on the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals last week ruled against the Trump-Vance administration’s motion to delay the move.
Trailblazing trans Brazilian lawmaker refuses to set foot in Trump’s America
Lebanese LGBTQ group responds to latest war
Inside the LGBTQ records of Todd Blanche and Markwayne Mullin
PHOTOS: Denali at Pitchers
Whitman-Walker Health to present ‘Pro Bono Excellence’ award to law firm
BLUF leather social set for April 10 in Rehoboth
Celebrations of life planned for Sean Bartel
The ‘X’ returns to court
Calendar: April 10-16
