Maine mom demands investigation into school for secretly helping 13-year-old daughter with gender transition

After finding a “chest binder” in her 13-year-old daughter’s room, a mother in Maine is demanding an investigation into the school officials responsible for enabling and hiding the girl’s…

After finding a “chest binder” in her 13-year-old daughter’s room, a mother in Maine is demanding an investigation into the school officials responsible for enabling and hiding the girl’s gender “transition.”

A chest binder is a specialized undergarment designed to flatten girls’ breasts. When Amber Lavigne found it amongst her daughter’s things, she was worried. But when she discovered social worker Samuel Roy had given it to her daughter at school, she was shocked.

Since Lavigne’s daughter had begun seeing Roy in October, he had been secretly helping her to “socially transition.” He also helped her hide it from her parents, promising the school wouldn’t reveal it either.

When she contacted the Great Salt Bay Community School District, the administrators defended Roy’s actions and informed Lavigne school staff had even begun to refer to her daughter by a different name and by different pronouns.

“This is unacceptable: a school employee secretly encouraged my daughter to change her gender and hide it from me,” Lavigne said in a press release from the Goldwater Institute, which is supporting the mother. “The school never stopped trying to keep me in the dark at every turn, repeatedly stonewalling me when I tried to find out what was going on. My parental rights aren’t up for debate: I deserve to know what’s happening to my child in school.”

On behalf of Lavigne and her daughter, Goldwater sent the school district a letter demanding an investigation into the Roy’s actions and for the school to adopt a policy to inform parents, “of any decision that affects their children’s mental health or physical wellbeing. This includes attempts to “socially transition” children or provide them with chest binders,” according to the press release. 

Goldwater believes the school’s actions were unconstitutional and violated Lavigne’s parental rights. 

“The Supreme Court has consistently held that parents have a fundamental right to control and direct the education, upbringing, and healthcare decisions of their children,” reads Goldwater’s statement. “The Court has upheld this right against bans on teaching certain languages, bans on private schools, and compulsory attendance laws—and it’s even held that parents have an absolute right to restrict visitation from their child’s grandparents.  

“In other words, parental rights are broad and tolerate only those intrusions that are completely necessary to protect the health and safety of children, like laws against child labor.” 

Goldwater is active in this fight because it says this type of unconstitutional activity is taking place at schools all over the country. Schools where, unfortunately, the administrators and staff think they know best when it comes to raising the community’s children.