A Colorado family’s outrage over their 11-year-old daughter being assigned to share a hotel room — and ultimately the same bed — with a transgender student during a school trip is gaining national attention as their federal legal battle exposes the increasing tension between transgender ideology and parental rights.
Joe and Serena Wailes said in 2023 that their daughter learned she would share a room with a biological male student who identified as female after arriving for a Jefferson County Public Schools-sponsored trip to Washington, D.C.
Their daughter was allowed to eventually change her room, but the family says she was instructed not to explain the reason for the change. The Wailes argue that the directive reflects a broader pattern of secrecy regarding gender-related matters within the Denver-area district.
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“They said that [they didn’t want us to talk about it] because they wanted to protect the privacy of the other student. And our thoughts are, ‘Well, what about the privacy of our daughter?'” Serena Wailes told Fox News.
The controversy is now the subject of a federal case before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit.
The Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), a non-profit legal group, filed a brief in late November on behalf of the Wailes and three other families who are challenging the school district for violating parents’ fundamental right to make decisions about the upbringing and education of their children.
“What happened to the Waileses’ daughter…was no accident,” reads the lawsuit. “It was the result of a Jeffco policy that directs Jeffco staff to assign students to share overnight accommodations with the opposite sex without notice to, or consent from, parents who object to that sleeping arrangement.”
It continues, “Jeffco keeps them in the dark about the sex of their child’s roommates. Worse, Jeffco will not allow them to opt out or honor requests to room children only with the same sex…This denial of a reasonable opt-out is precisely what [Mahmoud v. Taylor] forbids.”
The lawsuit alleges the incident occurred despite the district’s assurance that boys and girls would be assigned to separate hotel floors.
ADF attorneys filed the brief in Wailes v. Jefferson County Public Schools after a lower court dismissed the parents’ claims.
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