Category: American center for law and justice
Jesus, Trump, Charlie Kirk reportedly named role models by elementary students — but school staffer allegedly squashes picks
Elementary school students in Kansas reportedly chose the likes of Jesus, President Donald Trump, and Charlie Kirk as role models during an assignment — but a guidance counselor reportedly squashed those picks, KWCH-TV reported.
The incident at Marshall Elementary School in Eureka took place in late October, the station said, citing a civil rights complaint the American Center for Law & Justice filed Tuesday.
‘This action undermines trust between schools, students, and parents.’
The ACLJ is representing a parent and an elementary school student in the case, KWCH said.
The station reported that a guidance counselor assigned sixth-grade students to call out their role models in a project called “Find Your Voice” while one student designated as a “student teacher” wrote the names on a board.
The ACLJ provided the following narrative of what it said happened, KWCH noted:
“When a student identified Charlie Kirk as a role model, [the guidance counselor] got very uncomfortable and refused to allow this name to be written on the board, yelling that he was ‘not a hero,’ and that he was not a role model. The student teacher had already started writing Charlie Kirk’s name on the board, and was ordered by [the guidance counselor] to remove it. When another student selected President Donald J. Trump as a role model, [the guidance counselor] reiterated her prohibition even more angrily, stating that students could not write political or religious figures on the board, and in fact excluded political and religious topics altogether. However, [the guidance counselor] permitted other controversial figures to be listed as heroes.”
The station said it spoke with a Eureka parent of a sixth-grade student who recalled that another student wanted Jesus as a role model, but that choice also was not allowed as part of the assignment.
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The ACLJ’s complaint accuses the school district of religious discrimination, political/viewpoint discrimination, violation of free speech rights, and retaliation, KWCH noted.
Oh, and the law firm also accused the powers that be of encouraging students to not tell their parents about the incident, the station said.
Specifically, the ACLJ called out “egregious conduct in engaging in viewpoint-based discrimination against students who identified conservative political figures as role models, and the subsequent directive instructing students not to report concerns to their parents,” KWCH reported.
In addition, the ACLJ maintained that while students were allowed to list whomever they wanted in their written assignments, they were prohibited from calling out the names of “religious or political heroes publicly on the board,” the station said.
The ACLJ further argued that “the selective prohibition created immediate confusion among students about whose voices were valued and whose were not,” KWCH said.
More from the station:
The group also called out school’s response to what happened, saying that the administration claimed that prohibiting political and religious figures from being discussed in the “Find Your Voice” activity was in the name of being “inclusive and neutral.”
The American Center for Law & Justice particularly took issue with an alleged instruction for students to bring concerns to teachers or the principal first, not directly to their parents.
The ACLJ said the directive “instructing children not to report concerns to their parents … violates fundamental principles of parental rights, educational ethics, and child safety,” KWCH added.
The Eureka school board reportedly addressed the issue during a Dec. 8 meeting and met in executive session, the station said. However, the ACLJ said “no public response was provided, no corrective action has been announced, and the violations continue to remain unaddressed,” KWCH reported.
U.S. Rep. Ron Estes of Kansas’ 4th Congressional District, which includes Eureka, shared the following on social media about the controversy, the station said:
“It’s alarming to hear of a Kansas teacher silencing students’ voices in the classroom. Schools shouldn’t be a place where a teacher’s political beliefs are forced onto students. This is a violation of their constitutional rights and does not represent Kansas schools’ fundamental principles.
“Parents should have the confidence in schools to allow their children to grow and engage in classrooms that support their children’s ideas and opinions. This action undermines trust between schools, students, and parents. I do not condone this type of political censorship in any school.”
Marshall Elementary School Principal Stacy Coulter noted the following in response to the civil rights complaint and a request to discuss the issue, KWCH reported:
“We are aware of this incident and are always working with families and our school staff to make sure every learning activity is a positive and encouraging experience for every student.
“We are unable to comment on the individuals involved because of our commitment to the privacy of our students and employees. This information is also protected by confidentiality laws. Thank you for your understanding.”
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New York teacher compelled 7th graders to view deranged pornographic images, damning lawsuit claims
The conservative legal outfit American Center for Law and Justice filed a federal lawsuit on Monday against a public school district in New York after a teacher allegedly subjected seventh graders to pornographic materials on multiple occasions.
The complaint, filed on behalf of two parents and their minor children, alleges that “under the guise of an art lesson,” Bridgette Gates — a teacher with the Watertown City School District who “resigned as an art teacher, … was rehired as an English teacher, and remains on administrative leave,” according to Syracuse.com — intentionally exposed around 100 students to “pornographic and sexually explicit imagery over a two-week period in September 2025, without providing any advance notice to parents or offering an opportunity to opt out.”
‘It’s almost criminal.’
According to the complaint, Gates directed her students at Case Middle School to visit the gallery on the Keith Haring Foundation website using their school-issued Chromebooks during class time.
At the time of publication, the gallery contained various sexually explicit images and images of bodily mutilation, including multiple cartoons and paintings depicting men masturbating; a cartoon depicting a man with a fist-tipped penis; a cartoon depicting a man being choked by his penis; a painting mocking the martyrdom of St. Sebastian, depicting him with an erection and impaled by multiple airplanes; a painting of a character with a mouth in the place of an anus; and a painting of a penis wearing a wig.
The deviant agitprop was created by Keith Haring, a hallucinogenic drug-abusing homosexual activist who died of AIDS-related complications in 1990.
A spokesperson for the Haring Foundation told Artnet that it is aware of the conservative group’s response to the alleged incident at the school and acknowledged that some of Haring’s images may be inappropriate for some audiences.
The lawsuit alleges that Gates acknowledged that “some of the images were inappropriate” yet told her 12- and 13-year-old students to “ignore them and be mature.” Gates allegedly continued showing the images to kids despite signs of unease and resistance.
RELATED: Elementary school teacher allegedly possessed thousands of files of child sex abuse material
Photo by Adam Glanzman/Bloomberg via Getty Images
After learning of the content in late September, concerned parents contacted the teacher, school administrators, and local law enforcement.
Stephanie Boyanski, a plaintiff as well as the parent of one of the plaintiff students, told WWNY-TV in September, “It’s almost unbelievable.”
“It’s almost criminal,” said Heather Trainham, another parent.
Plaintiff parent Jessy Roberts noted that her son “knew it was inappropriate, but he wasn’t sure if he should speak out or not, because they’re of authority.”
‘Schools are not free to override that authority or to “correct” the family’s moral instruction.’
In the face of parental backlash and concerns raised at school-board meetings, Gates was reportedly placed on paid administrative leave, the assignment link was removed from Google Classroom, and the district admitted to parents that students had “come across inappropriate content.” There was, however, no apology from the district.
The ACLJ sent a letter on Nov. 21 to Larry Schmiegel, superintendent of the school district, stating that “because of the District’s lax monitoring of its curriculum and teachers, and its deliberate choice to shield the teacher from accountability, the harm done to Mses. Boyanski and Roberts’ children is irreparable and ongoing.”
The legal group demanded that Gates be issued a formal reprimand; that the school adopt a policy not to show children sexually explicit content without parental notification and to provide an opt-out if future curriculum includes such content; and to provide counseling for kids impacted by the images — and provided the district with a Dec. 1 deadline to act.
The lawsuit filed this week requests that the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of New York declare that the school violated parents’ First and 14th Amendment rights; bar the district from repeating its error; require the district to implement age-appropriate safeguards; and award damages for the alleged constitutional violations.
The district did not respond to Blaze News’ request for comment.
“Parents should not be forced to choose between public education and their family’s values. The Constitution draws a bright line: Parents, not the state, decide how and when their children are introduced to sexual content,” the ACLJ said in a release. “Schools are not free to override that authority or to ‘correct’ the family’s moral instruction through compulsory exposure to explicit material. When officials discard that line, the courts must restore it.”
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