The Education Department on Friday announced an investigation into Maine’s Department of Education for allegedly violating the Family Educational Rights Privacy Act (FERPA).
The investigation comes after a report from The Federalist on documents obtained by parental rights advocacy group Parents Defending Education (PDE) revealed that 57 Maine school districts concealed children’s issues with gender dysphoria from their parents.
From the announcement:
Today, the U.S. Department of Education’s Student Privacy Policy Office (SPPO) launched a directed investigation into the Maine Department of Education for alleged violations of the Family Educational Rights Privacy Act (FERPA). This investigation comes amid reports that dozens of Maine school districts are violating or misusing FERPA by maintaining policies that infringe on parents’ rights. The districts’ policies allegedly allow for schools to create “gender plans” supporting a student’s “transgender identity” and then claim those plans are not education records under FERPA and therefore not available to parents.
This action, alongside SPPO’s investigation initiated yesterday into the California Department of Education, is in furtherance of U.S. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon’s directives to strengthen FERPA enforcement by taking action against schools misusing FERPA and clearing the backlog of complaints submitted to SPPO that accumulated under the Biden Administration.
Education Secretary Linda McMahon argued that “Parents and guardians have the right to access their child’s education records to guide and safeguard their child’s mental, emotional, and physical well-being. Any policy to the contrary is both illegal and immoral.”
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A few weeks ago, I had the opportunity to meet with several young people who shared their detransitioning stories. It is deeply concerning to hear that teachers and school counselors in Maine are reportedly encouraging and helping students to undergo so-called ‘gender transitions’ while keeping parents in the dark. The Trump Administration will enforce all federal laws to safeguard students and families.
PDE President Nicole Neily said, “Under the previous Administration, we were fighting to protect our children from irreversible ‘sex changes’ – a path too often facilitated by school personnel who we entrusted with our children.”
In another statement, Neily asserted that “while Maine is certainly a bad actors, they are far from the only culpable party.” She said PDE “has identified over 1200 districts across the country and counting” that have imposed policies aimed at concealing a child’s gender dysphoria from their parents.
McMahon posted a video on X in which she explained that her team “heard disturbing reports that dozens of Maine school districts allow for schools to create gender plans that support a student’s transgender identity and then hide those plans from parents claiming they don’t fall under education records.”
It is deeply concerning to hear that teachers & school counselors in Maine are reportedly encouraging & helping students to undergo so-called ‘gender transitions’ while keeping parents in the dark.
— Secretary Linda McMahon (@EDSecMcMahon) March 28, 2025
We will enforce all federal laws to safeguard students & families. @nickineily pic.twitter.com/lVmqJtIzDo
The Family Education Rights and Privacy Act, passed in 1974, protects the privacy of student education records. It protects parents’ rights to access and make decisions about their children’s educational records. The legislation requires schools to obtain written permission from parents to release information from a student’s record.
The Federalist’s report detailed how Maine’s schools are promoting progressive gender ideology without parents’ knowledge.
According to documents reviewed by The Federalist and obtained by Parents Defending Education through public records requests, a significant portion of Maine’s public school districts — including its most populous ones — hide students’ critical medical and social information from parents if they are unwilling to allow their child to “transition” genders.
The school districts are potentially putting at risk the lives of their students — and at the very least their mental and physical health — by hiding the information from the parents, as allowing children to pursue such delusions is a dangerous experiment pushed only by the most radical predators and not backed by medical science.
Portland Public Schools, for example, has a “Transgender and Gender Expansive Students” policy in place that instructs staff to hide gender identity information from parents who might object to allowing their child to “transition” to the opposite gender, according to The Federalist.
Unfortunately, as Neily pointed out, this trend isn’t limited to Maine. Many other school districts in several states have similar policies aimed at violating parental rights while inculcating children with gender ideology.
This investigation is a sign that the Trump administration will not allow school districts to push children into transgenderism, which is a positive sign for the future.
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