VA Supreme Court Orders Reinstatement of Gym Teacher Who Was Suspended After Speaking Out Against Proposed Transgender Pronoun Policy

A gym teacher at Leesburg Elementary in Loudoun County, Virginia is set to be reinstated after a victory in the Virginia state Supreme Court, upholding a lower court ruling.

Tanner Cross was suspended with pay after a May 25 school board meeting where he said that he could not abide by proposed rules that would require teachers to address transgender students according to their chosen gender.

At the hearing, Cross declared, “I’m a teacher, but I serve God first. And I will not affirm that a biological boy can be a girl and vice versa, because it is against my religion. It’s lying to a child. It’s abuse to a child.”

According to the Alliance Defending Freedom, a trial challenging the policy is scheduled for Sept. 7 and 8, which will potentially decide the ultimate fate for Cross.

Zachary Faria stated in an op-ed for the Washington Examiner, “Under the guise of compassion for children, Loudoun County may still be able to compel teachers to adhere to the worldview of transgender activists, redefining sex and gender not just in violation of the religious rights of teachers, but basic biology. Cross’s recent victory is well-deserved, but the fact that it was necessary at all is a problem that goes far deeper.”

Rosie Oakley of Stand Up Virginia defended Cross as well and explained, “He wasn’t being unkind to anyone. He wasn’t attacking anyone. He wasn’t doing anything other than speaking his principles and his beliefs. It speaks to the fact that politics has entered the classroom and entered the school systems.”

The school system had previously said in a statement it “respectfully” disagreed with the decision the lower court had made and would appeal the ruling to the Supreme Court of Virginia.

In the statement, the school system insisted that “Many students and parents at Leesburg Elementary have expressed fear, hurt, and disappointment about coming to school.”

It would seem that there were also many also expressed an objection to the policy, as well as mask mandates, but of course, those objections don’t get taken into account.

The statement added that while the school system “respects the rights of public-school employees to free speech and free exercise of religion, those rights do not outweigh the rights of students to be educated in a supportive and nurturing environment.”