VA School District Rebukes Biden, Sides With Parents’ Rights

CV NEWS FEED // A Virginia school board has declined the Biden administration’s proposal to direct its policies regarding so-called “trans” issues.

The Department of Justice’s Community Relations Service (CRS) singled out the Roanoke County School District, which is located in the conservative southwestern part of the state.

The stated mission of CRS is to “resolve community conflicts and prevent and respond to alleged hate crimes arising from differences of race, color, national origin, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, religion, or disability.” CRS officials call the agency “America’s peacemaker.”

CRS offered to act as a “mediator” in Roanoke County, stepping in to decide whether its public schools would obey or defy the pro-parent guidelines implemented by the administration of Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin. 

The county’s two congressmen, Republican Reps. Ben Cline and Morgan Griffith, urged the county to reject the federal intervention. The county school board then made it clear that they wanted no part of the Biden administration’s proposed involvement. 

“We have rejected the offer from CRS and agree that it would not be in the best interest of our community to allow them here in Roanoke County,” school board Chairman Brent Hudson said  in response to Cline and Griffith. 

Early this month, Daily Wire journalist Luke Rosiak reported that CRS made the offer days after two pro-“trans” activists were arrested for unruly conduct at a county school board meeting. 

As a local news source noted, the demonstrators interrupted the district superintendent on multiple occasions, prompting Hudson to call for order. “One more outburst from whoever- we’ll ask the police to have you removed,” Hudson said.

The two activists continued to disrupt the meeting by shouting phrases such as “protect trans kids.” They were asked to leave and refused, leading to them being charged with trespassing. 

CRS emailed Roanoke School Board members that it was “aware of ongoing community tensions in Roanoke following the release of the new model policies for transgender students,” Rosiak reported:

A government “conciliation specialist” told the board members the agency specialized in “preventing and responding to community tensions and hate crimes” and wanted to “offer support and services as you work to manage conflict within the community” related to the transgender policies.

Rosiak added that despite the wording of the emails, “There were no documented ‘hate crimes’ in Roanoke.”

At the time, the Youngkin administration responded by highlighting the current DOJ’s concerning track record on parental rights issues. 

“The fact that the Biden DOJ hasn’t learned its lesson from the last time they overstepped their authority shows a stunning lack of judgment,” said Youngkin spokeswoman Macaulay Porter:

After playing into the false narrative that Loudoun county parents are domestic terrorists, it is trying to undermine Governor Youngkin’s new initiative to ensure that parents are part of the conversation about their own child’s identity in school.

Porter referred to a 2021 letter the National School Board Association sent to Biden branding parents who express various conservative views at school board meetings as potential “domestic terrorists.” Attorney General Merrick Garland, who is the head of the DOJ, responded by directing the FBI to look into such concerned parents.

Cline, a Catholic who has an “A” rating from the Catholic Accountability Project, celebrated Hudson’s decision to pass on the “mediation” offer. He told The Daily Wire,

Whether it’s targeting concerned parents in Loudoun County or seeking to intervene as “mediator” in Roanoke County School Board deliberations, the Biden DOJ has no right to try to insert itself into important issues facing parents and students. I applaud the Roanoke County School Board for rejecting the agency’s politicized attempt to overstep its authority and ensuring that the elected board members are the ones making the decisions.

A Republican stronghold, Ronoake County voted for Youngkin over former Gov. Terry McAuliffe by approximately 30 points in the 2021 gubernatorial election. President Donald Trump carried the county by nearly 22 points the year before.

The guidelines that were the focus of the DOJ’s attempt to “mediate” are formerly known as the “Model Policies on Ensuring Privacy, Dignity, and Respect for All Students and Parents in Virginia’s Public Schools.” 

Youngkin’s Department of Education introduced the Model Policies last month. As CatholicVote previously reported, the policies “protect children from gender ideology in locker rooms, bathrooms, sports, and classrooms.” They also prioritize “parental authority in children’s education, stating that parents are in the best position to make decisions about their children’s names, pronouns, or sex; not the government, schools, or the children themselves.”

CatholicVote reported last week that the policies were instituted “two years after the rape of a 15-year-old female student by a male student in the girl’s bathroom was covered up by Loudon County Public Schools.” The story, which is widely considered to have been a factor in Youngkin’s upset 2021 win, was first broken by Rosiak.

As CatholicVote also noted, “the rape and subsequent coverup notably occurred after the Virginia school district embraced pro-‘trans’ policies. The attacker in the case wore a skirt.”

Read more on the fight for parents’ rights in Virginia:

Virginia AG Defends Gov. Youngkin on Parents’ Rights
Virginia’s Biggest School District Violates New Pro-Parent Rules
Virginia Schools Protect Children and Parental Rights in New Policy