Fairfax County Public Schools (FCPS) in Virginia has backed down from one of several legal fights surrounding its embrace of radical gender ideology after a now-former female student challenged the district’s transgender bathroom and preferred pronoun policies.
America First Legal (AFL), which represents the Catholic former student identified in legal filings as “Jane Doe,” announced on Tuesday that it had obtained judgment on behalf of Doe. The district submitted a Rule 68 Offer of Judgment to avoid further litigation, and agreed to pay damages of $50 and Doe’s attorney’s fees.
“Our client’s rights were violated, and today she has justice,” President of America First Legal Gene Hamilton said. “This judgment is a crucial reminder that no one is above the law. Fairfax County attempted repeatedly to block this case, and they failed. America First Legal will not stop defending students whose safety and dignity are threatened.”
The case began last year, when Doe filed a complaint alleging she was forced to choose between her religious beliefs and punishment under the district’s policies requiring students to use “preferred pronouns” and allowing male students to access girls’ restrooms and locker rooms based on a subjective sense of “gender identity.”
The incidents occurred at West Springfield High School, where Doe said a male student, identified as “Richard Roe” in court filings, repeatedly used the girls’ restroom. Roe does not identify as transgender but said he used the girls’ bathroom because he was experiencing bullying in the boys’ bathroom.
School officials continued to allow using Roe to use the girls’ restroom and told Doe to use single-occupancy bathrooms instead if she was uncomfortable, the complaint alleges. Roe also continued to use the boy’s facilities, according to court documents. AFL argued the action violated Title IX, which bars sex discrimination as a condition of receiving federal funding.
Doe further alleged she was pressured to adhere to the district’s policy requiring students and staff to use “preferred pronouns.” One such example was a district-wide mandatory digital test that allegedly marked answers incorrect when participants disagreed with the statement that students “have the right to be called by their chosen name and pronoun,” the complaint alleges.
“This case is part of a much larger struggle for basic fairness and safety,” Ian Prior, senior counsel at America First Legal, said. “No student should face the threat of punishment or be pushed aside for asserting their fundamental constitutional rights. We are grateful for this victory, and we will continue standing up for families and fighting to restore common sense and safety in schools.”
Fairfax County Public Schools did not respond to a request for comment by time of publication.
However, attorneys for the school board said in its legal filing that the offer “is not an admission of liability or wrongdoing by the School Board and is inadmissible in any proceeding as evidence of any such admission.” Attorneys added that the offer “is not an admission of any of the facts alleged in the complaint.”
The case occurred during a transition from the pro-radical gender ideology Biden administration to the Trump administration. The Biden administration had reinterpreted Title IX protections to include “gender identity,” and had pressured schools to use “preferred pronouns” in opposition to biological reality and allow transgender-identifying students to access facilities matching their self-proclaimed identities.
President Trump rescinded those policies at the beginning of his second term and affirmed that there are only two sexes based on biology, male and female. Some school systems, like FCPS, have since been directly at odds with Trump administration rules barring forced pronoun usage and males in female spaces. Many school districts and institutions have refused to reverse course, despite radical transgenderism’s waning grip on the culture, and lawsuits have popped up around the country.
FCPS remains engaged in a separate legal battle with Trump’s Department of Education, which concluded in July that the district’s bathroom and locker room policies violate Title IX. The Department of Education concluded in the same investigation that several other Virginia districts are in violation of Title IX for similar policies, including Alexandria City Public Schools, Arlington Public Schools, Loudoun County Public Schools, and Prince William County Public Schools.
AFL said the outcome in the case sends a clear message that “students do not lose their constitutional rights at the schoolhouse door,” and called it “an important step toward restoring safe and reasonable restroom and locker room policies nationwide.”
Katherine Hamilton is a political reporter for Breitbart News. You can follow her on X @thekat_hamilton.
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