News & Commentary

Where were you a year ago? We were digesting the election results and hoping that the Trump presidency wouldn’t be based on the same hateful ideas that made up much of his campaign.  By February, we had stopped hoping and were hard at work trying to protect Rhode Island’s immigrant communities.  And that was just the beginning of what has been a challenging year for our founding principles.  We have been VERY busy – both challenging federal threats to our rights, and working to safeguard and expand justice in the Ocean State in response to those threats. Here’s a look at a sample month-by-month snippet of what we have been up to in resisting the Trump anti-civil rights agenda:

Rhode Island Department of Education Commissioner Ken Wagner announced his commitment tonight to require all school districts in the state to adopt comprehensive policies affirming the civil rights of transgender and gender non-conforming students. The announcement, made at a meeting of the Council on Elementary and Secondary Education, supports a petition that the ACLU of RI and nine other organizations filed last month seeking the adoption of a regulation to provide this protection.

Citing the unique discrimination faced by transgender and gender non-conforming students and the failure of many Rhode Island school districts to have policies in place tackling the issue, ten organizations – including the ACLU of Rhode Island, the RI State Council of Churches, GLAD, and the RI Commission for Human Rights – have formally petitioned the state Council of Elementary and Secondary Education to adopt statewide regulations that address the specific needs of this vulnerable group.

In the wake of the Trump Administration’s repeal of federal guidance addressing the rights of transgender and gender non-conforming students, the American Civil Liberties Union of Rhode Island today released a report finding that only 60% of the state’s school districts currently have policies in place to protect the rights of transgender students. In light of that finding, the ACLU report is calling for the state Department of Education to require adoption and implementation of such policies by all local school districts.  Notably, the report highlights the multitude of issues facing transgender and gender non-conforming students, including privacy and confidentiality, the use of students’ preferred pronouns and participation in gender-segregated activities.

For a few years, members of the LGBTQ community and other allies have been pressing the General Assembly for passage of legislation that would ban mental health providers from engaging in “sexual orientation change efforts” (colloquially known as “conversion therapy”) with clients who are minors. While the ACLU of Rhode Island both appreciates and supports the intent behind this bill, and has been an active supporter of LGBTQ rights for decades, we have opposed the legislation, largely because of some of its potential unintended consequences. In this blog, we try to explain our position more thoroughly, especially since our opposition to the legislation does not mean we oppose other means of addressing therapists who engage in this questionable practice.

In the wake of the Trump Administration’s repeal of federal guidance that clarified the protections available to transgender students under federal law, fifteen organizations supporting the rights of LGBTQ students have sent a letter to all school district superintendents in the state asking them to “forcefully and publicly reaffirm” their school district’s commitment “to providing a safe, protective and non-discriminatory space” for those students. Saying that the repeal action sent a “troubling message” to transgender youth, the groups called it crucial for superintendents to “urgently counter” it.

By Judge Stephen Fortunato (ret.)

By Johanna Kaiser, Development & Communications Associate