Lawsuit Aims to Change RI Policy That Allowed Teen to Socially Transition Without Mother’s Knowledge  

She got the knife away from her daughter. The teenager looked like a “deer in headlights” after the failed suicide attempt, her mother says.  

Driving to the hospital, the girl did not say much. She was taking medicine for her depression, but clearly, something was very wrong. The teen remained in the hospital from April to August 2022, during which time “Jane Doe,” used in place of the mother’s real name to protect her privacy and the privacy of her daughter, learned for the first time that the child’s Rhode Island public school had permitted the girl to begin socially transitioning to a boy without her mother’s knowledge.  

“I still have so many unanswered questions,” the mother told The Daily Signal, explaining that she has little contact with her daughter now because the teen has chosen to live with her father, who will affirm her gender identity.

From what the mother does now know, a Rhode Island policy allowed the West Warwick Public Schools system to permit her daughter to begin socially transitioning at school without parental knowledge or consent.  

Rhode Island state law prohibits “discrimination on the basis of sex” in schools across the state. In 2018, the Rhode Island Commissioner of Education issued a regulation pertaining to the state law, but expanded the definition of “sex” to include “sexual orientation, gender identity, or gender expression in schools.”  

The regulation not only redefined “sex,” but also directed school districts across the state to “adopt a policy addressing the rights of transgender and gender-nonconforming students to a safe, supportive and nondiscriminatory school environment.” The regulation further directed schools to consider issues such as “confidentiality and privacy” in its creation of a policy addressing gender identity.  

In the case of West Warwick Public Schools, the daughter’s district, a policy was adopted that allowed the school to hide a student’s gender identity from parents if “the administration determines that notifying the family carries risks for the student,” according to the policy.  

Now, the Law Centre at the Rhode Island Center for Freedom and Prosperity, a conservative policy organization, has filed a lawsuit on behalf of Jane Doe against Angélica Infante-Green, the Rhode Island commissioner of elementary and secondary education, aimed at forcing repeal of the regulation that redefined “sex” to include gender identity.  

In Rhode Island, school committee members are “caught between a rock and a hard place” as they seek to follow regulations from the state Department of Education and also follow federal law, according to Mike Stenhouse, the CEO of Rhode Island Center for Freedom and Prosperity.  

On his first day back in office on Jan. 20, President Donald Trump signed an executive order clarifying the definition of “sex.”  

“’Sex’ shall refer to an individual’s immutable biological classification as either male or female. ‘Sex’ is not a synonym for, and does not include, the concept of ‘gender identity,’” the order reads.  

Stenhouse says the lawsuit is aimed at removing “the hard place”—which he defines as the state regulation—so every school district in the state can “just choose to comply with federal law.”  

“I think federal law will ultimately win,” he added, “but who knows how long that will take to adjudicate?” In the meantime, “parents like Jane Doe are suffering right now.”  

The Rhode Island Department of Education responded to The Daily Signal’s request for comment with the briefs the department has filed with the court, but no further comment.  

Jane Doe told The Daily Signal that she thinks her daughter’s questioning of her gender began when the girl joined the Gay Straight Alliance club and a club for diversity at her school.  

“Starting in eighth grade they were, I guess, pushing this agenda on my kid, with these two groups that didn’t require a permission slip or an acknowledgment of any kind from the parent that these kids were involved in these groups,” Jane Doe said.  

Eventually, the mother learned her daughter was involved in the clubs, but says she did not realize they may have been encouraging her child to embrace a male gender identity.  

The school then began allowing her daughter to go by a different name and pronouns in school without Jane Doe’s knowledge, in spite of the fact that the mother was working in the school district at the time. By the start of her 11^th-grade year in the fall of 2024, the school officially changed the teen’s name on documentation, according to the mother.  

Following the teen’s suicide attempt, Jane Doe says she requested time off work from the school district, but later received a letter stating she had abandoned her job and was no longer an employee of the school.  

In response to The Daily Signal’s request for comment, West Warwick Public Schools Superintendent of Schools Karen Tarasevich said: “pursuant to federal privacy laws, we do not comment on individual students.”

While her child was in the hospital following the suicide attempt, Jane Doe asked a doctor treating her child if they were working with her daughter to address her past trauma, since the girl was sexually assaulted by a family member when she was only 5 years old.  

“I was told that they weren’t there to deal with that. They were there to focus on the here and now,” Jane Doe recalls the hospital telling her.  

Bradley Hospital in East Providence, where Jane Doe’s daughter was treated, did not respond to The Daily Signal’s request for comment.  

When it came time for her daughter to be released, the child chose to go live with her father, who Jane Doe had divorced some five years prior.  

Jane Doe does not know if her child has gone further than socially transitioning, to receive puberty blockers or hormones, because she currently does not have contact with her.  

Asked why she thinks her daughter has shut her out, the mother said she thinks it is because “I won’t affirm what the delusion is. Because I’m logical. Because I will not conform to this agenda, and I know my child. I know my kid, and in my heart of hearts … I think she’s still very confused with it all. I just hope they haven’t pushed her to the point of no return.”  

Oral arguments in the case are scheduled to be heard in court on Aug. 19. 

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