Supreme Court Won’t Hear Florida Parents’ Challenge Over Gender Secrecy at School

The U.S. Supreme Court on April 27 said it would not hear an appeal from Florida parents who say school personnel illegally did not disclose the gender transition of their daughter.

Six or more of the nine Supreme Court justices declined to take up the case after a federal district court and an appeals court ruled against the parents.

No justices disclosed their vote count. No justices commented on declining the petition, which was filed by Jeffrey and January Littlejohn in September 2025.

Lawyers for the couple and defendants, including the School Board of Leon County, Florida, did not immediately return requests for comment.

The Littlejohns sued school officials in 2022, alleging that they transitioned their daughter, referred to in court documents as A.G., to another gender without parental consent.

“Unbeknownst to Mr. and Mrs. Littlejohn until November 2, 2020, A.G.’s request to change her name with the guidance counselor unleashed a flurry of activity aimed at secretly affirming A.G.’s belief that she was nonbinary and was to be called ‘J.’ and be referred to by the pronouns ‘they/them’ by all of A.G.’s teachers in direct contravention of her parents’ decisions and direction to school staff,” the lawsuit stated.

The actions by school personnel violated the parents’ rights under the U.S. Constitution’s Fourteenth Amendment, as well as federal and state laws, the parents said.

A U.S. district judge dismissed the case, concluding that the federal claims did not meet the required standard. The remaining claims should be settled in state court, the judge said.

A majority of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit in 2025 upheld the decision, finding that the officials’ conduct was limited and thus required to “shock the conscience” under Supreme Court precedent. It did not do so in part because the child was “not physically harmed, much less permanently so.”

A dissenting judge said the majority used the wrong threshold because the actions fell within the officials’ authority and appeared to violate fundamental rights, and that the case should not have been dismissed.

The Supreme Court in 2024 turned away appeals from parents in Wisconsin and Maryland over policies that directed personnel to hide gender-related information from parents.

Justices in March blocked a California policy that largely prohibited school officials from notifying parents when their children asked to be referred to by a different gender. More recently, they declined to hear an appeal regarding a similar rule in Massachusetts.