by Andrew Fenner ‘27

After the June Supreme Court ruling in Mahmoud v. Taylor, in which parents had sued MCPS for not providing students the option to opt out of reading books with LGBTQ+ characters or themes, a U.S. District Court Judge has now ruled that MCPS pay out $1.5 million in damages to different families. The families who sued the county claimed that through its policy of denying parents the right to withdraw their children from lessons that covered LGBTQ+ topics, they were violating the families’ First Amendment right to freedom of religion.

In a 6-3 decision, the Supreme Court granted a preliminary injunction, pending a resolution in a lower court, which gave parents the right to opt out of these lessons. The author of the Supreme Court’s majority opinion, Samuel Alito, wrote that the instruction poses “a very real threat of undermining the religious beliefs and practices that the parents wish to instill,” and that by not providing students the option to opt out of such lessons, the county was violating their rights.

When the case was moved to a U.S. District Court to be resolved, the judge mandated the county pay out compensation to the families who brought on the suit, alongside filing a permanent injunction that secured these families their right to opt out.