Washington State Citizens Fight for Parents’ Rights, Girls Sports
Supporters of parents’ rights and girls sports submitted two citizen initiatives to the Washington State Legislature.
Restoring the Parents’ Bill of Rights, IL26-001, repeals sections of legislation passed in 2025 that stripped parents of their rights in education.
The measure guarantees parents have access to their children’s instructional materials and school records; requires parental notification when schools provide medical services; allows parents to opt children out of surveys, questionnaires and sexual education; and assures families their religious beliefs will be respected.
Initiative Measure IL26-638, Protecting Fairness in Girls Sports, prohibits “male students from competing with and against female students in athletic activities with separate classifications for male and female students.”
Brian Noble, CEO of the Family Policy Institute of Washington, explained to the Daily Citizen, “Both initiatives are a demonstration of how citizens in Washington can impact policy despite conservatives being significantly outnumbered in both the Washington House and Senate.”
He added:
Let’s Go Washington collected more than 416,000 signatures for the parents’ rights initiative and more than 445,000 signatures for the girls sports measure. Valid signatures from 308,911 voters are needed to send the measure to the legislature.
Brian Heywood, leader of Let’s Go Washington, commented on the two measures to the Washington State Standard, bluntly stating, “This is not a partisan issue, this is a common sense issue.”
The measures have “broad support,” he added, with more than half of the signatures coming from liberals and independents.
Both proposals are “indirect initiated state statutes,” citizen-initiated ballot measures that are first presented to the Washington Legislature. According to Ballotpedia, the Legislature then has three options:
- Adopt the initiative into law without sending it to the voters.
- Reject or not act on the initiative, in which case it is placed on the ballot for voters to decide.
- Approve an alternative version, in which case both the original proposal and the legislative alternative are placed on the ballot at the next state general election.
Current reports suggest the legislature will let the measures go the voters in November.
The Parents’ Bill of Rights has a convoluted history. In 2024, Let’s Go Washington submitted enough signatures to send Initiative 2081, the first version of A Parents’ Bill of Rights, to the state legislature. The initiative passed and was signed into law.
But then the legislature engaged in some tricksy behavior by passing HB 1296, a law which undermined local control of schools, supposedly “balanced” student rights with parents rights and actually eliminated some parents rights. Among other things, the legislation:
- Increased the time for schools to share records with parents from 10 business days to 45.
- Removed a parent’s right to access certain public school records, including medical or health records, and records of any mental health counseling.
- Eliminated a parent’s right to be notified by public schools prior to medical services or medications being offered or referred to his or her child (even when it will cost parents).
- Stripped the parental right to be notified and opt a child out of personally invasive surveys, assignments, role-playing activities, recordings or other student engagements.
- Removed a parent’s right to be notified if his/her child is taken or removed from a public school campus to stay at a youth shelter or “host home.”
The new measure restores the original Parents’ Bill of Rights, rolling back the damaging effects of HB 1296.
The Protecting Fairness in Girls Sports measure is also very much needed in Washington State. In December, Washington’s alternative weekly newspaper The Stranger reported, “In Washington, trans girls and boys have played with, and against, cis girls and boys for nearly two decades.”
“Cis” is a term made up by transgender activists to designate real boys and girls, rather than those who mimic the opposite sex with clothes, makeup, drugs, hormones and surgeries.
Washington’s Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction (OSPI) requires all local educational agencies “to allow all students, including transgender and nonbinary students, the opportunity to participate on the interscholastic sports team that most closely aligns with their gender identity.”
The U.S. Department of Justice and U.S. Department of Education are currently investigating OSPI for allowing “males to participate in female sports and occupy female-only intimate facilities, thereby raising substantial Title IX concerns.”
Family Policy Institute of Washington, a Focus on the Family-allied organization, supports both initiatives. Noble told us:
Focus on the Family also supports parental rights in education and protecting girls and women’s sports. We trust Washington Christians and conservatives will engage with the initiative process and support these to important measures.
Related articles and resources:
Family Policy Institute of Washington
Let’s Go Washington : Rally to Support The Initiatives
Athletes Rally at Supreme Court to Keep Boys Out of Girls Sports
Department of Justice Launches Title IX Task Force to Protect Women’s Sports
Focus on the Family Transgender Resources
How to Get In Touch With Your State Policy Group
Meet Three Heroes Working to Protect Colorado Children
President Trump: ‘There are Only Two Genders: Male and Female’
Supreme Court to Hear Title IX Girls Sports Case
Top 5 Moments From Supreme Court Arguments Over Girls Sports
Trump Signs Executive Order Protecting Women’s Sports and Spaces
Yes, Girls Care When Boys Take Their Trophies
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