A federal court in Washington state refused to dismiss a lawsuit from two Christian parents who claimed they were blocked from obtaining a foster license because of their beliefs on sexual ethics.
Judge David Estudillo of the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington denied the state government’s motion to dismiss Shane and Jennifer DeGross’ lawsuit, according to a report from The Christian Post.
Although the DeGrosses were foster parents between 2013 and 2022, they learned that the state required foster parents to provide children with resources that affirm their purported sexual orientation and gender identity.
As a result, the couple told the licensing agency they could not comply with the requirement, and they claimed that they lost their license.
The DeGrosses’ lawsuit asserted that Washington state violated their First Amendment and Fourteenth Amendment rights.
Estudillo wrote in his April 22 opinion that the Washington Department of Children, Youth, and Families “has forced the DeGrosses to choose between forefeiting their freedom of speech to obtain an unrestricted license, or upholding their beliefs.”
“The DeGrosses alleged sufficient facts to show a First Amendment violation unless the government can satisfy strict scrutiny,” Estudillo, a Biden appointee, added.
“At this stage, the DeGrosses freedom of speech claim continues forward.”
The couple filed their initial complaint in 2024 and submitted a foster care application along with a waiver saying they would “support a child’s right to privacy concerning their SOGIE,” referring to sexual orientation, gender identity, and expression.
But they also said in the waiver that they would “avoid the use of pronouns which are contrary to the child’s biological sex.”
The DeGrosses also agreed to take the required trainings as long as they were “not required to change their sincerely held religious beliefs.”
Washington state approved the waiver, allowing them to care for children between 2 and 5 years old, as well as older children on a short-term basis.
But the DeGrosses submitted a new complaint contending that the waiver process was “burdensome” and saying that their license “arbitrarily limits them” to only caring for some children.
They described their treatment as “worse than similarly situated foster parents with analogous conscience-based objections to supporting a child’s religious or cultural identities and practices.”
The Alliance Defending Freedom is representing the couple in court.
“When children are sleeping on cots in child-welfare offices for lack of loving homes, states like Washington should be doing everything they can to bring in more qualified foster parents,” Alliance Defending Freedom Senior Counsel Johannes Widmalm-Delphonse said in a statement about the most recent ruling.
“But Washington state is putting its own ideological agenda ahead of children’s needs, even though a federal court already enjoined a similarly unconstitutional policy in 2021.”
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