A federal judge issued a preliminary injunction late on Thursday, blocking parts of the anti-LGBTQ education bill signed into law by Gov. Kim Reynolds in May 2023. SF 496 attracted nationwide attention for its school book ban provision, but it went well beyond that, making changes to state law to effectively erase almost any acknowledgment of the existence of LGBTQ people from K-6 classrooms. Even before Republicans finished pushing the bill through the Iowa Legislature, it had become known as Iowa’s “Don’t Say Gay” law.
Along with mandating public schools remove all books with “descriptions or visual depictions of a sex act” — except for approved science or health class texts, and religious texts like the Bible — SF 496 also prohibits “any program, curriculum, test, survey, questionnaire, promotion or instruction” that references sexual orientation or gender identity in K-6 classes, and forbids all teachers and other school personnel from making any “accommodation that is intended to affirm the student’s gender identity” without first receiving written permission from a student’s parents or legal guardian. This last provision meant teachers would have to inform parents if a student asks to use a name or pronouns that are “different than the name or pronoun assigned to the student in the school district’s registration forms or records.”
The bill’s sweeping changes were scheduled to go into effect on Jan. 1, 2024, but a little over a month before that deadline, the ACLU of Iowa and Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund filed a federal lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of SF 496 on behalf of Iowa Safe Schools and seven students in the state.
“On its face, in its intent and purpose, and as applied, SF 496 forces educators to silence their LGBTQ+ students and deny them access to books, information, and ideas about sexual orientation and gender identity,” the ACLU and Lambda Legal argued in their brief filed on Nov. 28, 2023. “SF 496’s vague and overbroad language invites arbitrary and discriminatory restrictions on the rights of Plaintiffs and other LGBTQ+ students, stigmatizing them, preventing them from associating with each other for purposes of mutual support, education, and advocacy, and depriving them of the comfort of knowing other LGBTQ+ people exist and are happy and healthy members of our community.”
Two days later, another lawsuit was filed. Penguin Random House, four authors whose books were removed from schools seeking to comply with the book ban — Laurie Halse Anderson, John Green, Malinda Lo and Jodi Picoult — as well as an Iowa high school student, three Iowa educators and the state’s largest teachers union, the Iowa State Education Association, sued in federal court, challenging SF 496’s book ban as unconstitutional. Eventually, the Author’s Guild and four other major publishers — Hachette Book Group, HarperCollins Publishers, MacMillan Publishing Group and Simon & Schuster — joined this second lawsuit.
In December 2023, Judge Locher combined the two lawsuits, and following a hearing he issued a preliminary injunction stopping SF 496 from going into effect.
The Reynolds administration appealed the decision, and last August, a three-judge panel of the 8th Circuit Court of Appeal lifted the preliminary injunction, ruling that Judge Locher had used the wrong standard in evaluating SF 496, and sending the case back to him with instructions to use the standard established by the U.S. Supreme Court in Moody v. NetChoice.
Locher could not have used that standard, because the Supreme Court handed down its decision in the NetChoice case seven months after Locher’s preliminary injunction against SF 496.
In March, Locher issued his ruling on the challenge to SF 496’s book ban, imposing a new preliminary injunction to halt its enforcement.
“Plaintiffs have established, at minimum, several dozen unconstitutional applications of Senate File 496 involving books that have undeniable political, artistic, literary, and/or scientific value,” the judge wrote.
On Thursday, Locher issued his ruling addressing the remaining challenges to SF 496. Once again, there’s a preliminary injunction, but Locher did permit specific parts of SF 496 to remain in effect.
Locher upheld SF 496’s ban on “mandatory lessons or instruction to students in grade six or below that include detailed explanations or normative views on ‘gender identity’ or ‘sexual orientation.’” When the bill was being debated in the legislature, it was clear Republicans intended this provision would apply only to lessons about LGBTQ people, but the judge found that for it to be constitutional, the ban has to apply to everyone.
“It does not matter whether the lessons or instruction revolve around cisgender or transgender identities or straight or gay sexual orientations,” Locher wrote. “All are forbidden.”
SF 496 also stops all lessons related to gender identity or sexual orientation in K-6 classrooms, the judge ruled.
“School districts and teachers… may provide mandatory lessons or instruction to students in grade six or below that contain neutral references to gender identity (whether cisgender or transgender) or sexual orientation (whether gay or straight). The lessons and instruction simply cannot focus on those topics.”
Teachers can “assign books or provide lessons to students in grades six and below that contain characters with gender identities (cisgender or transgender) and sexual orientations (gay or straight) so long as gender identity and sexual orientation are not the focus of the book or lesson.”
Additionally, school districts and teachers “may make other neutral references to any gender identity and any sexual orientation during classroom instruction; for example, a teacher may refer to his or her partner even if the partner is same-sex.”
Schools cannot ban “Gender Sexuality Alliances (‘GSAs’) and other student groups relating to gender identity and/or sexual orientation.” Instead, students, including those in grades six and below must be allowed to join such groups if they want to.
“This means, among other things, that school districts and educators may: (a) advertise such groups in posters or over the loudspeaker to the same degree as any other student group; (b) serve as advisors for those groups; (c) encourage students to join those groups; and (d) otherwise discuss such groups with students outside mandatory classroom curriculum,” Locher wrote.
The judge also sharply narrowed the provision about obtaining written permission from parents before making any accommodation related to a student’s gender identity, finding it to be unconstitutionally vague for the most part.
It is “unconstitutionally vague because it does not define the word ‘accommodation’ and therefore does not provide fair notice about when the parental notification requirement applies,” Locher wrote.
“There is, however, one exception: the statute unambiguously requires notice when a student requests an ‘accommodation’ in the form of asking to be addressed using a “pronoun that is different than the … pronoun assigned to the student in the school district’s registration forms or records,” he continued. “As to that exception, the statute is enforceable; otherwise, it is not. Accordingly, state officials and school districts may enforce the parental notice requirement if a student asks for an accommodation in the form of a different pronoun but not as to any other requests for an accommodation.”
Judge Locher concluded that both the students and teachers represented by the ACLU of Iowa and Lambda Legal faced “irreparable harm” if the sections of SF 496 he found unconstitutional were allowed to remain in effect.
“This is an important win for our clients and others harmed by this overreaching law,” ACLU of Iowa staff attorney Thomas Story said in a written statement after the preliminary injunction was issued. “The federal district court has blocked the state from enforcing many of the worst aspects of SF 496.”
Story said, “Iowa school districts should take note of this decision and revert any changes they have made to comply with these unconstitutional mandates from the state.”
On Friday, Attorney General Brenna Bird released a statement saying she would “continue to fight to uphold Iowa’s law protecting our children. Children shouldn’t have inappropriate books or instruction. Parents need to be kept informed about their kids.”
The attorney general said her office is “looking at next steps, including appeal.”
