Terese Bastarache (left), joins Jodi Underwood, Rachel Goldsmith, Jeremy Kauffman and Stacey Messina in a display of showing the XX chromosome at the Bow girls’ soccer game on Tuesday, September 24, 2024. (Photo by Geoff Forester, Concord Monitor)
Parents in Bow have filed a lawsuit against the Bow School District, accusing the district of stifling free speech after they were issued no-trespass orders for protesting against transgender girls participating in girls’ sports teams.
On Sept. 17, during a Bow High School girls’ soccer game against Plymouth Regional High School, parents Anthony Foote and Kyle Fellers attended wearing pink armbands emblazoned with “XX,” a reference to the sex chromosomes associated with biological females to protest against allowing transgender girls participating on girls’ sports teams.
On that day, Parker Tirrell, a transgender girl was playing for the Plymouth Regional High School girl’s soccer team.
But the match was paused for 10 to 15 minutes as school officials asked the parents to remove their armbands, and they were subsequently issued no-trespass orders for targeting a student on the soccer field. The school district also had to call additional police to maintain order amid the protest.
In response, a lawsuit was filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of New Hampshire by Foote, Fellers, Nicole Foote, Anthony Foote’s wife; and Eldon Rash, a family member of Fellers, naming several school officials, including the Superintendent of Schools Marcy Kelley, Principal Matt Fisk, Athletic Director Mike Desilets, as well as Bow Police Lieutenant Phil Lamy and soccer referee Steve Rossetti.
The plaintiffs are challenging several school policies that emphasize “mutual respect, civility, and orderly conduct,” and prohibit actions that “injure, threaten, harass, or intimidate” or disrupt school activities.
“Parents don’t shed their First Amendment rights at the entrance to a school’s soccer field. We wore pink wristbands to silently support our daughters and their right to fair competition. Instead of fostering open dialogue, school officials responded with threats and bans that have a direct impact on our lives and our children’s lives,” said Fellers in a statement. “And this fight isn’t just about sports — it’s about protecting our fundamental right to free speech.”
The plaintiffs are represented by attorneys from the Institute for Free Speech.
Del Kolde, a senior attorney at the institute, pointed out that over 50 years ago, the Supreme Court ruled in the case Tinker vs. Des Moines Independent Community School District that Americans have the right to express silent protest by wearing armbands to school, as was done during the Vietnam War, emphasizing that this situation is no different.
“Today, the political debate is different, and the wristbands are pink, instead of black, but the First Amendment protects our clients no less today than it did fifty years ago,” said Kolde. “Applying these policies to ban pink wristbands as a silent show of support for women’s sports is unconstitutional viewpoint discrimination.”
As a result of the no-trespass orders, Foote was barred from entering any district property, but his order was lifted on Sept. 21. Fellers’ order, however, remains in effect until the end of the fall sports season.
According to the lawsuit, an addendum to the no-trespass order issued on Sept. 25 allowed Fellers to participate in middle school parent pick-up and various administrative purposes, such as voting and attending school board meetings. But games, sports practices, extracurricular activities, drop-offs, and high school pick-ups were absent from the list of permitted activities.
The lawsuit aims to allow the parents to attend their children’s school events, including the ongoing soccer season, and to express their views on political and social issues, particularly those related to “protecting women’s sports.”
This case comes in the wake of a recent law signed by Gov. Chris Sununu, which prohibits students assigned male at birth from competing on female sports teams in grades 5 through 12.
A federal court earlier this month ruled that Parker Tirrell and another transgender girl, 14-year-old Iris Turmelle, can continue playing on girls’ sports teams while their lawsuit proceeds.
“I spent 31 years in the United States Army, including three combat tours, and the school district in the town I was born in — the one my family has seven generations of history in — took away those rights. I sometimes wonder if I should have been here, fighting for our rights, rather than overseas,” said Foote.
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