SCOTUS to hear parents’ case against law making WA a sanctuary state for trans minors

Attorneys from Schaerr Jaffe LLP and First Liberty Institute filed their opening merits brief in International Partners for Ethical Care, Inc. v. Ferguson, asking the Supreme Court to reverse a Ninth Circuit ruling that found the parents lacked standing to challenge Washington's legal framework.

The Supreme Court granted the case in June and has scheduled oral arguments for Dec. 7.

The case centers on Washington's controversial Senate Bill 5599 and related statutes governing runaway minors. A coalition of 16 states urged the Supreme Court earlier this year to hear the case, arguing that Washington's system undermines parents' constitutional rights to direct the upbringing and medical care of their children.

Before Washington lawmakers changed the law in 2023, shelters generally had to notify parents within 72 hours, preferably within 24, when they received a runaway minor and provide the child's whereabouts and condition. An exception existed when notifying a parent could subject the minor to abuse or neglect.

SB 5599 expanded the state's definition of a "compelling reason" not to notify parents to include circumstances in which a minor is seeking or receiving "protected health care services," which under Washington law include transgender-related treatment, even when there has been no allegation of parental abuse or neglect. In those cases, the shelter notifies the Washington Department of Children, Youth and Families (DCYF) rather than the parents.

According to the parents' brief, under the amended framework, DCYF may provide only notice that it received a report involving the child without providing the child's location or condition. There is also no requirement that parents be informed that their runaway child is seeking transgender-related treatment.

The filing states that a qualifying minor may remain in a licensed shelter for up to 90 days when a parent does not request the child return home or attempts to contact the parent fail, including when a minor refuses to provide parental contact information.

“The goal of the state should be reunification of families, not the separation of children from their parents,” Gene Schaerr, managing partner at Schaerr Jaffe, said. “When governments usurp the essential role of loving parents in the lives of their children, tragedy is inevitable.”

The parents' attorneys also point to statements from Democratic lawmakers during debate over SB 5599 as evidence that parents who opposed their children's transgender identities were specifically contemplated by the legislation.

Sen. Marko Liias, the bill's sponsor, said the legislation applied when a young person was seeking transgender-related care “in the face of opposition and hostility from their family.”

“When a family is standing between their young person and essential health care services,” Liias said, the state needed to ensure minors were “getting the care they deserve” before focusing on “the important reunification process.”

Rep. Jamila Taylor similarly said during House debate that some children were not receiving “really encouraging language” from their parents. “Home is not safe,” Taylor said. “We must step in. We must provide a place for this child.”

Judge Lawrence VanDyke, who dissented when the Ninth Circuit declined to rehear the case, wrote that the amendment “treats the parents of children suffering from gender dysphoria as per se neglectful or abusive and does not require the shelter to contact them,” according to the Supreme Court filing.

The new brief also details how the plaintiffs claim the laws are already affecting their families.

One mother says she hesitates to discipline her child because she fears creating a rift that other adults could exploit to encourage her daughter to leave home and seek transgender-related services. The attorneys argue the laws have caused parents to “walk on eggshells” around their children.

Another plaintiff couple alleges their daughter has already received mental-health treatment for gender dysphoria without their consent and that Washington laws prevented them from accessing records regarding that treatment.

The case is part of a broader fight over parental rights in Washington. In a separate case, a federal court allowed a lawsuit to proceed against Washington's foster-care licensing rules brought by Christian foster parents who alleged state officials denied them a standard license because they would not agree to facilitate a child's social or medical gender transition.

Parents, educators, and school officials have also sued Washington over HB 1296, after the law stripped protections contained in the state's parental bill of rights.

The Supreme Court is not yet deciding whether SB 5599 and the related laws violate the Constitution. The immediate question is whether the parents have standing to challenge them.

The Ninth Circuit found the parents' feared injuries too speculative. The parents argue that reasoning creates a Catch-22: Washington can withhold information from parents, but parents cannot challenge the system until their child actually runs away and the alleged constitutional injury occurs.

Their brief relies on the Supreme Court's recent Mirabelli decision, arguing that parents can have standing to challenge policies that shut them out of decisions involving their children's mental health without first proving their children have already been subjected to those policies.

“Parents should not have to wait until their children are irreparably harmed to seek protection from courts,” Ryan Gardner, senior counsel at First Liberty Institute, said. “No family should face the terror of having their children run away to the state and then have those children hidden from them.”