Detroit Lakes Superintendent Mark Jenson broke into a tense school board work session Tuesday to read an email that had just arrived from the district's lawyer.
"Two families have joined the ACLU, and we will be facing a lawsuit," he said.
The ACLU of Minnesota and the Minneapolis law firm Lockridge Grindal Nauen filed suit September 22 in Becker County District Court on behalf of two Detroit Lakes students, naming the district and four school board members. The target is the ban those four members passed in July on rainbow stickers, flags, buttons, and similar displays in school buildings, aimed at the 2-by-3-inch "safe space" stickers some teachers post by their classroom doors.
The complaint argues the ban violates students' rights to free speech and equal protection under the Minnesota Constitution. It also claims the ban "constitutes discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity," which the Minnesota Human Rights Act prohibits in education, and that the vote was arranged in violation of the state's Open Meeting Law.
"They have the right not to experience bias and discrimination, and that is what a ban like this causes for them," said Catherine Ahlin-Halverson, the ACLU of Minnesota's deputy legal director.
One of the plaintiffs, identified as L.S., is president of the Detroit Lakes Queer Community, the high school club formerly called the Gay-Straight Alliance. L.S. is suing through their mother, Amber Estenson, a Minnesota content creator known online as That Midwestern Mom. The other student, C.H., is suing through parent Nicole Hadding, according to the ACLU. Ahlin-Halverson said that since the ban, other students have told L.S. that the way they express their identity, including what they wear, was inappropriate and banned by the board.
The Open Meeting Law claim goes back to how the ban arrived. It was not on the July 27 agenda. It was added once the meeting began and passed 4-2 that morning, and the other two members, who oppose it, did not see it until then, as we reported when the ban was still in limbo. Minnesota law requires school board meetings to be open to the public. The lawsuit alleges the four members met privately "for the purpose of reaching agreement to introduce and vote for the LGBTQ+ Pride Ban."
Through a public records request, the ACLU obtained text messages between board members from before the vote. One week before the meeting, board member Michelle Okeson sent board member Sanford Nelson a link to a group called Courage is a Habit, whose mission statement reads, "Reject inclusion. Embrace exclusion. Make courage your habit."
"These school board members are banning expression, in this case rainbows, because of their anti-LGBTQ bias, and that's unlawful," Ahlin-Halverson said. The four board members named in the suit did not respond to MPR News' requests for comment.
Nelson, who introduced the ban, defended it at Tuesday's session. He said the matter was decided in July and the board's job now is to carry it out legally. "A farmer that spreads manure on ground and then plows it up and plows it up just raises a stink, and that's what it seems like we're doing," he said. The policy now under consideration, he said, "will meet the legal muster and move us forward with the July resolution."
That policy was itself a surprise to some members. Board member Julie Smith-Yliniemi said she had been sent a version revised by the district's attorney the week before, then learned at the meeting that the board would instead take up language borrowed from a policy under consideration in Hastings Public Schools. "It just seems to be confusion, and then more confusion, and then more confusion," she said.
Board member Mary Rotter, who also opposes the ban, said the board has received 31 messages about the July vote. "Twenty-five of those were against the vote that was passed. Six of those were for the vote," she said.
The ACLU says a more neutral-sounding policy will not fix the problem. "The regulation of speech because you don't agree with it is unconstitutional," Ahlin-Halverson said, arguing that pursuing a cleaner policy to remove "the same rainbows they banned in the rainbow ban" does not change the legal picture.
In a statement to MPR News, Jenson said the administration has not "directed the removal of any materials from schools" while the board works on the policy. The new language is scheduled to be read at the board's meeting on Monday, September 28.
The Detroit Lakes district enrolls about 2,500 students across its high school, middle school, and two elementary schools, according to federal enrollment data. Detroit Lakes Senior High, where L.S. is a student, has about 790.
Sources
MPR News: Minnesota ACLU sues Detroit Lakes Public Schools over rainbow ban
ACLU of Minnesota: ACLU-MN Sues Detroit Lakes Public School District for Rainbow Ban
Minnesota Statutes 363A.13: Discrimination in education
Minnesota Statutes 13D.01: Open meetings
Enrollment figures from allk12's analysis of National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) Common Core of Data.
