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Federal Court Blocks UC Pronoun Mandate, but the Same Rule Remains in California K-12 Policies

California Family Council review finds Elk Grove, Long Beach, Lodi, San Francisco, and Exeter districts still classify declining to use preferred pronouns as harassment, a rule a federal judge just found likely unconstitutional at UC

SACRAMENTO, CA — A federal judge has ruled that the University of California cannot punish students for referring to classmates by the pronouns and names that match their biological sex. The ruling strikes at a campus speech code that treated misgendering a transgender-identified individual as harassment.

It also exposes a problem closer to home for California parents. The same rule is written into the policies of public school districts across the state, even after two recent U.S. Supreme Court decisions made clear that government cannot force Americans to speak against their convictions.

On September 15, U.S. District Judge Fred W. Slaughter of the Central District of California granted a preliminary injunction in Defending Education v. Anguiano (read the court’s order). The order bars UC from enforcing its Sexual Violence and Sexual Harassment Policy against the group’s members “for referring to another person, in a commonplace way, using pronouns or birth names, that are consistent with the other person’s birth sex but inconsistent with that person’s gender identity.”

What UC banned

UC’s policy included a Frequently Asked Questions section, known as FAQ 14, added in August 2024. It stated that prohibited conduct “includes intentional or repeated use of a name or pronoun inconsistent with the individual’s gender identity (i.e., misgendering)” (read the original policy). Violators faced discipline “up to and including dismissal.” UC’s mandatory SHAPE training went further. It presented a student who kept calling a transgender classmate by a birth name as an example of creating a hostile environment.

Four students at UCLA, UC San Diego, and UC Irvine told the court they believe “that people are either male or female.” They wanted to speak according to that conviction but stayed silent out of fear of punishment.

UC argued that its policy regulated conduct, not speech. The court disagreed. Judge Slaughter relied on the Ninth Circuit’s 2025 decision in Bates v. Pakseresht, which held that Oregon likely violated the First Amendment by requiring prospective adoptive parents to affirm a child’s gender identity, including by using preferred pronouns. He also drew on the Supreme Court’s March 2026 decision in Chiles v. Salazar.

The judge concluded that the UC policy “compels speech and is viewpoint-based.” Quoting Ninth Circuit precedent, he wrote, “There is no categorical ‘harassment exception’ to the First Amendment’s free-speech clause.” The court also noted that UC did not attempt to show its policy could survive strict scrutiny.

After the lawsuit was filed, UC rewrote FAQ 14 and dropped the SHAPE scenario. The court was not persuaded. It found that the revised version “continues to prohibit the intentional and repeated use of biological pronouns.”

“It is unconstitutional for public universities to compel student speech,” Defending Education President Nicole Neily said in a statement. UC spokesperson Rachel Zaentz told KQED that the university disagrees with the ruling and that the policy is designed to prevent harassment, “not to regulate protected speech.”

The injunction is narrow. It protects Defending Education’s members, and UC may still discipline genuine abuse of any student. UC must respond to the complaint by October 8.

Recent Supreme Court rulings

Two recent Supreme Court rulings frame what is at stake.

In Mahmoud v. Taylor, decided June 27, 2025, the Court ruled 6 to 3 that a Maryland school board burdened parents’ free exercise of religion when it forced young children into LGBTQ-themed storybook lessons with no notice and no opt-out. The ruling reaffirmed that public schools must accommodate families’ religious convictions on questions of sex and gender.

In Chiles v. Salazar, decided March 31, 2026, the Court ruled 8 to 1 that Colorado’s ban on certain counseling conversations about gender must face strict scrutiny because it regulates speech based on viewpoint. Writing for the majority, Justice Neil Gorsuch said the First Amendment “stands as a shield against any effort to enforce orthodoxy in thought or speech in this country.”

The same rule is in California’s K-12 schools

UC is not an outlier. The California School Boards Association (CSBA) publishes a model regulation on nondiscrimination and harassment that districts across the state adopt nearly word for word. It lists “Refusing to address a student by a name and the pronouns consistent with the student’s gender identity” as the first example of prohibited gender-based harassment. CSBA describes the rule in its own legal guidance.

The language remains on the books in districts large and small:

  • Elk Grove Unified, one of the largest districts in the state, re-approved the language on November 10, 2025, in its AR 5145.18. Employees who violate the regulation face discipline “up to and including dismissal,” and students in grades 4 through 12 face possible suspension or expulsion.
  • Long Beach Unified includes the same example in its AR 5145.3.
  • Lodi Unified‘s policy page, revised March 10, 2026, still displays it.
  • Exeter Unified has it as well.
  • San Francisco Unified says its rule applies to “an intentional and persistent refusal to respect a student’s gender identity.”

The rule rests on a foundation the state itself has abandoned. For more than a decade, the California Department of Education’s AB 1266 guidance told schools that intentionally using a student’s incorrect name and pronoun, or persistently refusing to use chosen names and pronouns, should be treated as harassment. CSBA cited that guidance in its own materials.

CDE has since replaced it with new AB 1955 guidance that contains no pronoun mandate and no harassment example. That same CDE page now carries a court-ordered notice, compelled by Mirabelli v. Olson, affirming that parents have a federal constitutional right to be informed when their child expresses gender incongruence.

The state guidance is gone. Yet Elk Grove re-approved the rule in November 2025, months after Mahmoud. And six months after the Supreme Court decided Chiles this March, all five districts still post it.

In one respect, the K-12 rule is broader than UC’s. The UC court faulted the original FAQ 14 because it was not tied to an objective standard of severe harassment. The CSBA model includes no such threshold. It bans conduct that has the “purpose or effect” of creating an “offensive educational environment,” and it names declining to use preferred pronouns as a textbook example. It excuses honest mistakes but makes no allowance for a teacher’s faith or a student’s conscience.

Are these policies in jeopardy?

Judge Slaughter’s order binds only UC, and only with respect to Defending Education’s members. No school district is required to change its policy tomorrow.

The reasoning behind the ruling is another matter. Bates is binding Ninth Circuit precedent for every public agency in California, including every school district. The court also relied heavily on the en banc Sixth Circuit’s 2025 decision in Defending Education v. Olentangy, which involved a K-12 district, not a university. As Judge Slaughter noted, a school district “has more leeway to regulate speech than a university.” Yet the Sixth Circuit still barred the district from punishing students for the commonplace use of biological pronouns.

Districts will argue that they may restrict student speech that substantially disrupts school. The Sixth Circuit answered that argument directly. It found that the Olentangy district had “introduced no evidence that the use of biological pronouns would disrupt school functions or qualify as harassment under Ohio law.” With Chiles now requiring strict scrutiny for viewpoint-based speech rules, a California district that disciplines a student or teacher under the CSBA language would face a lawsuit built on even firmer ground than the one that just defeated UC.

A national pattern

Courts across the country are rejecting pronoun mandates. The Sixth Circuit ruled 10 to 7 in Olentangy, and the district later settled without paying damages, agreeing to an injunction that bars punishing students for using pronouns consistent with a classmate’s biological sex.

In Virginia, French teacher Peter Vlaming agreed to use a student’s chosen name but declined to use male pronouns, and the school board fired him under its policy against gender identity discrimination. The Virginia Supreme Court reinstated his lawsuit, warning against coercing citizens into “pledging verbal allegiance to ideological views” that violate their beliefs. The school board then paid $575,000.

In Ohio, Jackson Local School District paid $450,000 to teacher Vivian Geraghty after a federal court ruled that forcing her to use students’ preferred names amounted to “compelled speech.” The Sixth Circuit had earlier held in Meriwether v. Hartop that pronouns are “a matter of academic speech,” because they communicate a message about whether a person can have a gender identity inconsistent with his or her sex.

What policymakers can do

CSBA can revise its model regulation to remove the pronoun example, as CDE has already removed its guidance. Legislators can ask CDE whether it considers the CSBA language consistent with current law. School boards can review their own nondiscrimination regulations before facing litigation.

“Scripture teaches that God created them male and female, and millions of Californians, including students and teachers, share that conviction,” said Greg Burt, Vice President of the California Family Council. “No student should be threatened with discipline for saying what is true. This ruling confirms that the First Amendment protects the student who speaks from conscience. Now every school board in California has to ask why the same rule UC just lost in court is still sitting in its own policy manual.”

Source Documents

About California Family Council
California Family Council works to advance God’s design for life, family, and liberty through California’s Church, Capitol, and Culture. By advocating for policies that reinforce the sanctity of life, the strength of traditional marriages, and the essential freedoms of religion, CFC is dedicated to preserving California’s moral and social foundation.

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