A Vermont teenager and her father, a high school soccer coach, have sued after they were both suspended after calling a male student who identifies as a transgender girl “male.”
Randolph Union High School suspended Blake Allen and her father, Travis, prompting the lawsuit. After the lawsuit was filed, the school dropped Blake’s suspension. It is unclear if this was linked to the lawsuit or not.
“I was suspended because I voiced my opinion that a man shouldn’t be in the women’s locker room,” Blake Allen recalled. “A lot of my classmates were supportive; I think most people and the school are, they are just too scared to speak up because they see all the backlash I’m getting for it.”
“I made a social media post that referred to the male student as a male and I was punished because of it,” Travis Allen echoed. “Because I ‘misgendered’ him.” The school has claimed that the suspension was due to an incomplete background check for the coach.
Blake Allen was changing in the locker room with other girls on September 21 when the trans-identifying student entered, according to the lawsuit. Some of the girls told The Daily Signal they asked the student to leave, but he refused, instead standing in a corner and watching them while they were changing.
The next day, the lawsuit claims, Blake Allen was discussing the issue with a fellow student in French class when she called the trans-identifying boy a “dude,” adding that he did not belong in the girls’ locker room.
The next week, the lawsuit claims, the trans-identifying boy told others in his math class, “I’m going to f***ing kill Blake Allen.” That evening, someone identifying as the mother of the boy in question stated on Facebook that Blake Allen “made up the story for attention” and that “truth will prevail.”
Travis Allen replied, “The truth is your son watched my daughter and other girls change in the locker room. While he got a free show, they got violated.” The school district superintentend then allegedly said that Travis Allen had “misgendered a transgendered student” and suspended him without pay for the rest of the season, according to the lawsuit.
Travis Allen agreed to eschew using gender pronouns but balked when the district demanded he issue a public apology.
“When he (Orange Southwest School District Superintendent Layne Millington) asked me to publicly apologize, I thought about it,” Allen said to The Daily Signal. “I did pause and waited a few seconds. And I’m thinking, ‘If I say that I’ll apologize, I’ll be able to coach my youngest daughter for the rest of the season, but I’m going to, in turn, hurt my other daughter, because I’m not standing up for what we believe in, I’m just cowing to them like so many other people have done. And I just can’t do that.’”
The district allegedly demanded Blake Allen serve a two-day out of school suspension, write a letter of apology to the boy as well as join a “restorative circle” with the school’s equity coordinator “and at least two students who can help her understand the rights of students to access public accommodations,” The Daily Signal noted.
“I said I would rather have a five-day suspension than apologize because I’m not sorry,” Blake Allen told Fox News’ Tucker Carlson.