Mirabelli, et al. v. Olson, et al.

Can you force a teacher to lie to parents about their children? That’s exactly what is happening in California classrooms, where school districts have implemented mandates to silence teachers and keep parents in the dark about their kid’s gender confusion. Unfortunately, these policies pushed by radical gender ideologues have spilled out across the country and over 1,000 school districts across the country now have “Parental Exclusion Policies.”

Elizabeth Mirabelli and Lori West—two award-winning middle school teachers in Escondido, California—love teaching, and they love the children they teach. When their school district, Escondido Union School District (EUSD), put in place a Parental Exclusion Policy, Elizabeth and Lori were unwillingly drafted into being foot soldiers for gender ideology. As Christians, they believe that God created their precious students as male and female—immutably and without mistake. But under EUSD’s Parental Exclusion Policies, they were forced to perpetuate a deeply immoral scheme of deception against parents with children who suffer from gender dysphoria.

This meant that when a student requested that teachers and administration use a new name and pronouns that differed from their biological sex, as part of a ‘social transition’—and requested that teachers not reveal this information to their parents—teachers like Elizabeth and Lori were required to hide this vital information from the parents. EUSD’s Parental Exclusion Policy mandated that they lie to parents about what is going on at school, by requiring that they revert to the student’s legal name and biological pronouns in conversations with parents to hide a child’s new ‘gender identity ’from his or her parents.

Faced with this horrendous violation of a parents’ rights and danger to their students, Elizabeth and Lori could not stay silent. On behalf of Elizabeth and Lori, Thomas More Society filed a federal lawsuit against the California Department of Education and EUSD.

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By September 2023,TMS attorneys had won a first-of-its-kind preliminary injunction, protecting Elizabeth and Lori from EUSD’s Parental Exclusion Policy, which U.S. District Court Judge Roger Benitez called a “trifecta of harm” in his landmark opinion.But the fight didn’t end there. The assault on parents’ rights and children’s safety reached the highest levels of California’s government. 

At the start of 2024, TMS attorneys moved to include California Attorney General Rob Bonta as a named defendant, citing his aggressive enforcement of these policies. Bonta made clear that the State of California viewed compliance with Parental Exclusion Policies not as a mere recommendation but as a constitutional mandate. After the September 2023 injunction, Bonta issued misleading “legal alerts” claiming the Mirabelli injunction had no statewide effect and even sued schools that chose transparency with parents about their children. 

In August 2024, Thomas More Society expanded Mirabelli into a class action lawsuit, seeking class-wide protection for parents, teachers, and school districts against California’s radical anti-family ideology. Included are a school district that seeks to be transparent with parents but faces threats from Bonta’s office, as well as two sets of parents whose children ‘socially transitioned’ without their knowledge while at school. These parents know, firsthand, the extreme harm that results from radical gender policies proliferating across the UnitedStates.

On July 17, 2025, TMS attorneys filed a Motion for Summary Judgement, a Motion for Class Certification, and a Motion to Exclude Experts.

The inviolable and natural bond between parents and child is a gift that cannot be replaced. That is precisely why Thomas More Society will continue to advocate on behalf of teachers, parents, and school districts who are speaking out and challenging school policies and state laws that violate parents’ rights and hurt children.

The next major hearing in the case is set to take place on September 29, 2025.

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