New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy defended action taken by his administration to prevent school districts from informing parents that their children are showing signs of gender transitioning.
In June, three New Jersey school districts—Middletown, Marlboro, and Manalapan-Englishtown Regional—approved policies to require that parents be told if their children showed signs of “transitioning” to another gender. Specifically, these signs include changes in the name, pronouns, or bathrooms the student uses.
Just a day later, Mr. Murphy’s administration announced that it would be suing the school districts, with the state contending that these policies entailed “outing” the students and would fail to provide students with a “safe” learning environment.
“Without question, the discriminatory policies passed by these boards of education, if allowed to go into effect, will harm our kids and pose severe risk to their safety,” New Jersey Attorney General Matthew Platkin said after filing emergency lawsuits challenging the school board policies.
During a July 23 appearance on CBS’s “Face the Nation,” Mr. Murphy fielded questions from anchor Margaret Brennan about the lawsuit.
Ms. Brennan tied her question to Mr. Christie’s earlier position.
“Why is Mr. Christie wrong when he says parents are the ones who know best here and they should be involved?” Ms. Brennan asked.
“Listen, we took these actions, because it’s the right thing to do to protect these precious young people,” Mr. Murphy replied, accusing Republicans of using the issue to wage “a complete cultural war” as Republicans charge progressives with doing the same.
Mr. Murphy claimed that “parents are always involved.”
“Certainly, in our administration, they’re always at the table, and they always will be,” he said.
But he said that the “rights of children” need to be protected, and he suggested that the move to block school districts from telling children’s parents about attempts at gender transition would secure this end.
“Let’s be smart about this. Let’s protect the rights of these precious kids. Let’s do things the right way, the American way,” Mr. Murphy said. “And I think if we do that in a spirit of respecting everyone’s rights, protecting the LGBTQIA+ community, we will land at a good place.”
Past litigation has found that while children have rights when dealing with the government, such as in the case of juvenile criminal justice cases, whether children have a right to privacy from their parents is largely up to the parents themselves. Children are generally recognized to not have the same constitutional rights as adults.
Ms. Brennan then asked Mr. Murphy about the argument that blocking a school counselor or staff member from telling a parent about their child attempting to change gender is a violation of a constitutional right of parents to direct and control the upbringing of their children.
“Why isn’t that compelling?” she asked.
Mr. Murphy said that parents are “the existential reality in the upbringing of any child without question.”
“I don’t deny that for one second,” he said. “But let’s not violate the ... constitutional and civil rights of precious young folks in many cases, who are coming to grips with life and as they grow up and grow older, let’s be respectful of that. Let’s be all in this together as opposed to this ‘us versus them’ demonizing.
“When that happens, invariably, it’s the LGBT community that gets—particularly trans folks who get—behind the eight ball.”
