Published April 30, 2025
On April 30, 2025, EPPC scholar Eric Kniffin filed an amicus brief in support of a rehearing en banc in the Eleventh Circuit case Littlejohn v. School Board of Leon County, Florida. January and Jeffrey Littlejohn originally filed suit after learning that their middle school daughter’s public school had secretly met with her to develop a “gender support plan” that let her choose what name, pronouns, and restrooms she would use, and with what sex she would be housed on overnight trips. The school even deliberately used female pronouns with the Littlejohns to conceal their actions from the girl’s parents. An Eleventh Circuit panel originally ruled against the parents, who are now petitioning for the entire Eleventh Circuit to reconsider the panel’s decision.
The brief urges the Eleventh Circuit to affirm parents’ fundamental rights and hold the school district’s policy unconstitutional.
Kniffin also tells the stories of five members of Our Duty, a nonprofit that helps parents protect their children from the dangers of gender ideology.
As Kniffin summarizes in the brief:
Caselaw, Florida law, and Our Duty each affirm that, excluding abusive behavior, parents have the fundamental right to raise their children in the manner that they see fit. Government schools violate parents’ Fourteenth Amendment rights when they box parents out and take it upon themselves to socially transition and treat their minor children. The Eleventh Circuit should grant the Littlejohns’ petition to make this clear.
Eric Kniffin is a fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center, where he works on a range of initiatives to protect and strengthen religious liberty as part of EPPC’s Administrative State Accountability Project.
