Latest news with #AmberLavigne
Daily Mail
29-07-2025
- Daily Mail
Mom who claims woke school hid 13-year-old's gender transition suffers crushing court defeat
A mom in Maine suffered a crushing defeat in court following claims that a woke school hid her child's gender transition from her and their family. Amber Lavigne, of Wiscasset, discovered a chest binder in her 13-year-old child's room when the then-eighth grader was at a school dance in December 2022. Yet, an appeal for the lawsuit Lavigne launched against the school in 2023 has dismissed by the First Circuit Court of Appeals. Lavigne's child said, at the time, that the binder - a garment used to flatten the chest of the wearer - was bought for them by a social worker named Sam Roy at Great Salt Bay School in Damariscotta. In her appeal, Lavigne argued that her claims 'sufficiently establish the existence of a policy or custom of withholding... the district court erred in declining to address the first element of municipal liability, and her allegations established that the Board violated her right to direct the education of her child.' According to documents, the court concluded in her appeal that 'Lavigne's allegations fail to plausibly show that either the Board had a policy of withholding or that the Board later ratified the individual defendants' decision to withhold information from Lavigne.' The court furthered that Lavigne did not provide 'sufficient' evidence to argue of a policy or custom for withholding and concealing information. 'None of [Lavigne's] allegations support the inference that the Board maintained an unwritten custom or policy of withholding information from parents,' court documents said. 'Without this factual support, Lavigne's contention that the school acted pursuant to an unwritten "blanket policy, pattern, and practice of intentional withholding and concealment of such information from all parents" is based solely on her "information and belief".' The mother and her lawyers demanded, at the time of the initial lawsuit, a 'full investigation into Mr. Roy's decision to give a 13-year-old girl an undergarment without notice, consent or involvement of her mother.' They also claimed the school's actions broke the Fourteenth Amendment by blocking Lavigne's fundamental constitutional right to control and direct the education, upbringing, and healthcare decisions of her daughter,' Adam Shelton, a lawyer at Goldwater, wrote in a letter. The school district was further accused by Lavigne of withholding and concealing her child's transition, including the use of a name and pronouns that were not assigned to the child at birth. The law firm argued that although students have confidential access to mental healthcare through school, social transitioning is 'not protected by statutory confidentiality'. 'The "social transitioning" of Ms. Lavigne's daughter without her notice, consent, or involvement in the process alone violated her constitutional rights,' the letter said. 'But even if secrecy were required by Maine law, such secrecy would still violate Ms. Lavigne's constitutional rights. Ms. Lavigne has a clearly established constitutional right to control and direct the education, upbringing, and healthcare decisions of her child. The actions of the School, school employees, and the District have violated that right.' Lavigne pulled her child from the school, allowing her daughter to cut her hair short but still referring to her by feminine pronouns. The mother told National Review that she believes her daughter is still her daughter at heart and that she acts femininely when she's not thinking about it. She added that she was not opposed to her daughters eventual transition, and said: 'If she at 18 starts taking testosterone and decides to mutilate her body, am I going to express to her some concerns? Absolutely,' she told the National Review. 'Am I going to write my kiddo off? Never in a million years. This is my baby girl. At the end of the day, I'm not going to destroy my relationship with my child to be right.' 'At the end of the day, she is who she is,' the mother said. 'If she thinks she's going to live a more fulfilled life as a male, that's up for her to decide as an adult. At 13, it's up to me to safeguard my child against doing things to her body that she can't reverse.'
Fox News
08-04-2025
- Fox News
Maine mom's child's gender ordeal cries out for Team Trump
It was a day like any other for Maine mom Amber Lavigne, until she stumbled across something in her 13-year-old daughter's bedroom that would change the course of their lives: a chest binder, which is used to flatten the wearer's chest to create a more masculine appearance. When Amber spoke with her daughter about this, she learned that a male social worker at the Great Salt Bay Community School had given this chest binder to her child in his office, instructed her on how to use it, gave her advice about "changing" her gender, and told the student she didn't need to tell her parents about any of it. As Amber dug deeper, she uncovered an even more troubling truth: it wasn't just one person at the school keeping things from her. School officials had been referring to her daughter by a different name and using different pronouns — effectively pushing her into a "social transition" without Amber's knowledge. So, it came as no surprise last week when the U.S. Department of Education launched an investigation into the Maine Department of Education over the decision of Maine schools to hide information about gender transitions from parents. At every step in Amber's case, the school has denied, obfuscated and refused to turn over any records related to her minor child and the school social worker. To this day, Amber has been unable to obtain the records she seeks about her child from the taxpayer-funded school. The school board never punished anyone in connection with either the social transitioning of Amber's daughter without her knowledge or the social worker's decision to give the child a chest binder. Instead, the board unanimously approved a contract extension for that same employee after the Goldwater Institute, where I work, sued the district on Amber's behalf for violating her parental rights. This isn't just happening in Amber's district. Late last month, a new report exposed 57 Maine school districts for having policies that allow the school to hide from parents whether school officials are referring to their children as a different gender. But even school districts without these explicit policies are still hiding information from parents and excluding them from their child's education. Of particular concern to the U.S. Department of Education is how Maine schools could be manipulating a state law that allows social workers to establish confidential relationships with a child at the child's school to prevent parents from exercising their right to inspect and review education records related to their child's counseling. This would violate the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA), a law that protects student privacy, while ensuring the right of parents to access their own child's educational records. That's exactly how the Great Salt Bay Community used this law. Amber requested all the records from her daughter's sessions with the school social worker. But Superintendent Lyndsey Johnston refused to hand them over, citing the Maine statute. In other words, the department's concerns about how this law could potentially be used have already been realized with Amber's case. The Great Salt Bay Community School has not only refused to take responsibility for its actions, its leaders have criticized Amber for continuing to ask for information about her daughter. Moreover, the superintendent refused to continue meeting with her after the school decided not to punish the social worker, but did offer to meet with her child alone – a laughable "solution" considering the school's previous actions. The school board never punished anyone in connection with either the social transitioning of Amber's daughter without her knowledge or the social worker's decision to give the child a chest binder. The school board even blamed Amber's public criticism and statements for bomb threats against the school, even though public records requests proved they had no evidence whatsoever that the threats had any connection to Amber's case. Amber's lawsuit against the school for violating her constitutionally protected parental rights is currently pending before the First Circuit. But the U.S. Department of Education's investigation highlights the need for state-based policies to promote parental rights and academic transparency in public education.
