News Release
For Immediate Release: 9.9.26
Contact: John Manning, media@firstliberty.org
Direct: 972-941-4453
Parents Urge U.S. Supreme Court to Allow Suit Challenging Washington State Law that Revokes Rights Regarding Runaway Kids
Attorneys ask Justices to reverse appeals court decision that blocks parents from challenging law until after runaway children are already permanently harmed.
Washington, D.C.—Attorneys for Schaerr | Jaffe LLP and First Liberty Institute filed their initial brief at the Supreme Court of the United States on behalf of a group of parents urging the Justices to reverse a decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit that prevents parents from challenging Washington state laws that strip parents of their rights if they refuse to affirm their runaway child’s claimed “gender identity.” The Supreme Court has scheduled oral argument in the case for December 7, 2026.
You can read the brief here.
“The goal of the state should be reunification of families, not the separation of children from their parents,” said Gene Schaerr, managing partner at Schaerr | Jaffe. “When governments usurp the essential role of loving parents in the lives of their children, tragedy is inevitable.”
“Parents should not have to wait until their children are irreparably harmed to seek protection from courts,” said Ryan Gardner, Senior Counsel at First Liberty Institute. “No family should face the terror of having their children run away to the state and then have those children hidden from them. We hope the Supreme Court will stand up for parents who desperately want to protect their children.”
International Partners for Ethical Care, et al. v. Ferguson, et al. involves a challenge by several parents to Washington state law that facilitates runaway minors’ access to so-called “gender affirming treatment” without parental notice or consent. The laws treat parents objecting to their child’s claimed “gender identity” as automatically abusive or neglectful and permits the state to hide information about a runaway child’s condition and location on that basis. It also empowers the state to refer runaway children for “gender-affirming” healthcare without parental notice or consent. Further, the laws allow state officials to delay reunification of runaways with parents until the parents’ objection to their child’s gender identity is resolved to the state’s satisfaction.
The Ninth Circuit denied the parents’ standing to sue. The court’s decision means that parents can’t bring a legal challenge to a state law that violates their parental rights until it’s too late—such as when their child actually runs away from home or tries to undergo “affirming” psychological and/or medical procedures.
In the merits brief, attorneys argue, the laws interfere “with their parent-child relationships and creates incentives for their children to run away and bypass their parents in decisions about gender identity. And because of these incentives and interference, at least some [parents] have chilled their parenting to avert catastrophe, and all live in increased fear that the laws will do as designed to their children.”
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About First Liberty Institute
First Liberty Institute is a non-profit public interest law firm and the largest legal organization in the nation dedicated exclusively to defending religious freedom for all Americans.
To arrange an interview, contact John Manning at media@firstliberty.org or by calling 972-941-4453.
