A transgender girl missed her high school graduation and her parents sued after school officials in Mississippi ordered her to “dress like a boy.”
LB Brown’s family sued the school district on Thursday after Harrison Central principal Kelly Fuller and school district superintendent Mitchell King told her to follow the boys’ dress code on her graduation day.
Male students graduating from the school are expected to wear a white shirt, tie and black slacks, while women are expected to wear white dresses.
A federal judge in Mississippi denied the motion Friday, asking her to wear a dress and heels under her robes, and as a result, a humiliated LB withdrew from the ceremony altogether.
LB — who picked out a white graduation outfit before being told she couldn’t wear it — wasn’t the only student to miss the milestone moment.
Another student, Jai Dallas, was pulled from the lineup just before graduating after the school told her not to wear black pants on stage.
LB Brown (right) and her mother Samantha (left) spoke out after LB, a transgender girl, was told she couldn’t wear a white dress to her graduation at Harrison Central High School in Mississippi
LB in the white gown she had chosen for her graduation, but was not allowed to wear
School district Superintendent King told LB’s mother, Samantha Brown, that the transgender student could not participate in the graduation ceremony unless she was “wearing pants, socks and shoes, like a boy.”
LB said she was called to the office of the principal of Harrison Central High School two weeks ago for an “unexpected warning” about what she could and could not wear to graduation.
She says she is humbled by the verdict.
“If I go to graduation in what they asked me to wear, I’d tell them it’s okay, and it’s not,” she said.
“It would just feel like I was overshadowed and infected by bigotry, hatred.
“My graduation, it’s the beginning of a new life, a better life.”
Participating in a graduation ceremony is voluntary and not a constitutionally protected right for any student, said Wynn Clark, the attorney for the local public school district, according to the Guardian.
Before the school’s warning, LB and her mother assumed that the school would respect her decision to wear similar attire as she did at graduation because the school had accepted LB’s decision to dress in female clothing in the past.
LB reportedly wore dresses throughout her high school days. She has dressed in “girl’s clothes” to classes and extracurricular events, according to the lawsuit, and should not be discriminated against during graduation.
“When we looked at that policy, our impression was that my daughter identified as a woman every day of her life. She dresses in feminine clothes every day of her life,” said Brown WDTV.
“Our client is being shamed and humiliated for explicit discriminatory reasons, and her family is being denied a one-time milestone in their daughter’s life,” said Linda Morris, a staff attorney with the Women’s Rights Project of the American Civil Liberties Union.
“No one should be forced to miss graduation because of their gender.”
The American Civil Liberties Union of Mississippi is representing the 17-year-old college student and her parents, Samantha Brown and Henry Brown.
Participating in a graduation ceremony is voluntary and not a constitutionally protected right for any student, according to court documents.
The ACLU says the federal judge’s ruling not to reverse the decision in Gulfport, Mississippi, is “as disappointing as it is absurd.”
The lawsuit cites a violation of their child’s civil rights, accusing the school district of sex and gender discrimination and violating the teen’s First Amendment rights.
Fellow student Jai Dallas also missed the milestone ceremony after wearing black pants instead of a white dress — and claims she was told she couldn’t take part minutes before she was supposed to go on stage.
Jai Dallas (second from left) also missed her graduation after being told she couldn’t wear black pants on stage — minutes before she was due to pick up her high school diploma. Her mother Caren Dallas (second from right) and sister Raniah Braclet (far right) defended Jai
Her mother Caren Dallas said she was told Jai “can take her pants off and walk on stage, but she needs white shoes.” So she could walk in her underwear, but she can’t walk in pants.’
Her grandmother, Michelle Faison, traveled 800 miles to see her graduate.
“I don’t understand how this, such an important moment, can be taken away from a child who has worked for 12 years to get here,” she said.
Her sister, Raniah Braclet, graduated from Harrison Central three years ago and said she is no longer proud to be from Harrison central.
“It was a very horrible experience to see my sister not be able to graduate from where I graduated,” she said.
Caren Dallas plans to continue to look for answers first thing Monday, she said.