9th Circuit sides with teachers fired for opposing trans guidance

A federal appellate court has sided with teachers fired and then reinstated over their opposition to school district guidance allowing trans-identified students to enter locker rooms and restrooms based on their self-declared gender identity instead of their actual sex. 

A three-judge panel on the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit ruled in favor of Oregon teachers Rachel Sager and Katie Medart in a decision released Monday. Tuesday’s ruling reverses a district court decision rejecting the teachers’ claims for First Amendment damages after the Grants Pass School District 7 terminated them due to their advocacy against trans ideology.

Sager, who was an assistant principal in the district, and Medart, who taught health and science, launched the “I Resolve” campaign in early 2021 in response to the district establishing “Gender Identity, Transgender, Name, and Pronoun Guidance” stating that “the District will not prohibit students from accessing restrooms, locker rooms or other facilities which may be separated by gender, that are associated with the student’s preferred gender identity.”

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As the two employees worked to launch the “I Resolve” campaign, they consulted with district leadership, who gave them no indication that they “could be violating district policies.” As explained in the opinion, the campaign consisted of a video featuring Sager and Medart offering “alternative proposals regarding students’ preferred pronouns and names as well as restroom use” that was uploaded to YouTube. 

Sager and Medart found themselves subject to complaints from other staff in the district over their work on the “I Resolve” campaign, which detractors maintained violated the school district’s prohibition on engaging in political speech using its resources or during working time. Amid the firestorm, the employees were placed on paid administrative leave and terminated following the conclusion of an investigation that determined they had violated school district policies. 

In the fall of 2021, the employees were reinstated to positions at an online school within the district, which significantly reduced their day-to-day interactions with students compared to their previous roles.

Sager and Medart filed a lawsuit against the school district alleging violations of their rights under the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution and the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, as well as Article I, Section 8 of the Oregon Constitution and Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Defendants named in the complaint were the school district itself, Superintendent Kirk Kolb, North Middle School Principal Thomas Blanchard and three members of the district’s board of directors.

While the three-judge panel agreed that the district violated the teachers’ rights under the U.S. Constitution by engaging in content and viewpoint-based discrimination in violation of the First Amendment, as well as viewpoint discrimination in violation of the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, they disagreed that the district violated their rights under article I, section 8 of the Oregon Constitution. 

The court also concluded that the district violated their rights under Title VII by terminating them for their “biblically-based views on gender and sexuality.” The case has now been remanded to the district court for further proceedings. 

“Vigilance is necessary to ensure that public employers do not use authority over employees to silence discourse, not because it hampers public functions but simply because superiors disagree with the content of employees’ speech,” the opinion stated. 

Alliance Defending Freedom, the religious liberty-focused legal nonprofit that represented the plaintiffs, reacted favorably to the decision. In a statement shared with The Christian Post, ADF Senior Counsel Matthew Hoffman expressed gratitude that “The court affirmed that educators don’t give up their First Amendment rights just because they work behind the schoolhouse gate, and public schools can’t retaliate against speech simply because they disagree with what’s said.”