The law firm suing Temecula’s school district over its critical race theory ban announced Thursday, Nov. 30, it is seeking a court order to stop the district from enforcing that ban as well as a policy requiring parents be told if their child identifies as transgender.
Its motion asks a judge to bar the Temecula Valley Unified School District from enforcing school board policies “that censor state-mandated curriculum,” a news release from Public Counsel states.
“Across the district, teachers are avoiding discussions of racial and other forms of inequality for fear of violating the ban, making it impossible to teach subjects like American history and government with even a semblance of accuracy,” lawyers argue in their motion.
“Denied access to concepts being learned by their peers elsewhere in the state, Temecula students are at a marked disadvantage as they prepare for college, careers, and participation in a diverse democracy.”
Public Counsel’s release includes a quote from Amy Eytchison, a Temecula elementary school teacher who is one of the lawsuit plaintiffs.
“Temecula’s students have no time to lose,” Eytchison said in the release. “The board’s policies are denying them an accurate education and a safe school environment. They’re suffering personally, academically, and socially.”
Members of the board’s conservative majority did not immediately respond to requests for comment Thursday morning. District spokesperson Jimmy Evans said via email that the district “is unable to comment on pending litigation.”
A self-described nonprofit public interest law firm, Public Counsel, representing the teacher’s union as well as teachers and students in Temecula schools, sued the district in August to stop enforcement of the critical race theory ban passed in December by the board’s conservative bloc.
At the time, board members Danny Gonzalez, Joseph Komrosky and Jen Wiersma contended that critical race theory was too divisive for the classroom and teaches a victim mentality to students.
In court papers, Public Counsel said Temecula teachers “are self-censoring to avoid using the word ‘white’ when discussing subjects like Jim Crow segregation and European imperialism, and restricting their answers when students ask about anti-Black violence.”
“Forbidden from fully discussing racial oppression, Temecula’s educators have no way to accurately and supportively guide their students in difficult but necessary discussions of topics including slavery, segregation, colonialism, and immigration,” Public Counsel argued.
“And teachers at every level are witnessing the erosion of trust among their students, who rightfully question whether their instructors are answering their questions fully and honestly.”
After filing suit, the firm amended its complaint to also challenge a board policy passed in August that requires the district to notify parents if their child is transgender. The board majority said parents have a right to know everything about their child.
The district’s transgender policy mirrors that of Chino Valley Unified School District’s. California Attorney General Rob Bonta sued Chino Valley, and a judge in September granted Bonta’s request for a temporary restraining order to block that district from enforcing its policy.
Rachel Dennis, who oversees a local LGBTQ safe space, said some LGBTQ youth “have expressed fears of ‘abuse, violence, or even being kicked out of their home if they are forcibly outed,’” Public Counsel asserted in court papers.
“Their fears are justified: One transgender Temecula student has already been kicked out after his parents discovered his name change in school records.”
Public Counsel added: “The prospect of being forcibly outed has driven many students to suppress their identities, and Dennis has had to direct multiple Temecula students to a mental health crisis hotline since the Board passed the Policy, an outcome directly at odds with the Board’s professed desire to improve students’ mental health.”
The conservative majority’s statements prove its transgender policy is rooted in discrimination, Public Counsel contends. Lawyers allege that Komrosky “openly belittled transgender youth during a podcast appearance in which the host referred to being transgender as a ‘disease.’”
Public Counsel also criticized what it called the board’s “censorship of curricular material about the LGBTQ rights movement.”
Earlier this year, Gonzalez, Komrosky and Wiersma rejected an elementary social studies curriculum with supplemental material that mentioned slain LGBTQ civil rights leader Harvey Milk. The board eventually adopted the curriculum following a standoff with Gov. Gavin Newsom, who threatened to fine the district and send textbooks to Temecula.
In court documents, Public Counsel alleges that Komrosky encouraged parents “to investigate and seek removal of 16 books from district libraries” while Wiersma, during an unannounced visit to Temecula Middle School, asked librarians to take down a Banned Books Week display.
The librarians removed the books, including “Bridge to Terabithia,” “The Giver” and “The Hunger Games,” from the display, Public Counsel alleged.
According to the law firm, “12 preeminent experts in the fields of education and health” filed declarations supporting Public Counsel’s injunction request, including literary critic and Harvard University Professor Henry Louis Gates Jr.
Temecula’s school board is “deliberately deploy(ing) the apparatus of the state in service of their ideology, limiting what teachers may teach; what students may read; and what textbooks, library books, and coursework may be offered,” Gates, who is head of Harvard’s Hutchins Center for African and African American Research, said in the release.
A hearing on Public Counsel’s request is scheduled for Jan. 24 in Riverside Superior Court.