{"id":21515,"date":"2026-03-09T08:15:09","date_gmt":"2026-03-09T08:15:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/?p=21515"},"modified":"2026-03-09T08:15:09","modified_gmt":"2026-03-09T08:15:09","slug":"state-legislators-strike-down-parental-rights-bill","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/?p=21515","title":{"rendered":"State Legislators Strike Down Parental Rights Bill"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n Reading Time:<\/span> 4<\/span> minutes<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Editor\u2019s note: Republican lawmakers struck down a parental rights bill in South Dakota, fearing it could potentially be used to enable abusive parents. Do you think this was the right decision?<\/em>\n<\/p>\n

The Republican-controlled South Dakota House of Representatives rejected a wide-ranging parental rights bill on Tuesday that would have prevented public schools from withholding information about a trans-identified student\u2019s social transition and mental health from their parents, with 30 Republicans joining Democrats in opposing the measure.<\/p>\n

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The lower chamber rejected\u00a0Senate Bill 190\u00a0in a\u00a035-30 vote\u00a0after its companion bill, Senate Bill 190, had passed the Senate earlier in the day on Tuesday by a\u00a019-15 vote.\n<\/p>\n

The measure would have amended state law to clarify that government entities \u201cmay not substantially burden the fundamental right of a parent to direct the upbringing, education, health care, and mental health of the parent\u2019s minor child, without demonstrating that the burden imposed on the parent is required by a compelling governmental interest as applied to the parent and the parent\u2019s minor child and is the least restrictive means for furthering that compelling governmental interest.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

The measure would have protected parents\u2019 right to direct the moral and religious training and education of their minor children and instruct employees of the state or its political subdivisions that they cannot \u201cencourage or coerce a minor child to withhold information from the minor child\u2019s parent\u201d and \u201cwithhold from a minor child\u2019s parent information that is relevant to the physical, emotional, or mental health of the parent\u2019s minor child.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

The bill would have also prohibited employees of the state and its political subdivisions from seeking to provide any type of surgical procedure, medical examination or mental health treatment to a child without receiving parental consent. Local school boards would be instructed to develop a process by which parents can review the curriculum at their child\u2019s school and agree to have their children withdrawn from any \u201cspecific instruction or presentation,\u201d including lessons on human sexuality.\n<\/p>\n

The legislation would have ordered school boards establish a process for providing consent before \u201cthe parent\u2019s minor child may use a name or nickname other than the minor child\u2019s legal name or a derivative or diminutive of the minor child\u2019s legal name.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

School district employees would have been prohibited from withholding information or coercing a child to withhold information from parents about their \u201cpurported identification with a gender that corresponds to the minor child\u2019s internal and subjective sense of self, disconnected from the biological reality of the minor child\u2019s sex.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

Sioux Falls Republican Rep. Taylor Rehfeldt, who voted against the proposal, was among those voicing concern that the legislation could protect abusive parents and criminalize the actions of mandatory reporters, such as teachers and coaches.\n<\/p>\n

\u201cIf there\u2019s any doubt in any of our minds that this bill passage would enable a parent to put that abuse on their child, we can\u2019t pass it,\u201d Rehfeldt told the\u00a0South Dakota Searchlight.\n<\/p>\n

Before the House approved the legislation, an amendment was adopted that sought to ensure that the bill wouldn\u2019t impede child abuse or neglect investigations.\n<\/p>\n

\u201cI just wanted to bring an additional amendment, just further clarifying that this legislation does not impede an investigation into child abuse or neglect,\u201d Republican Rep. Heather Baxter, who introduced the amendment, said, according to\u00a0KOTA.\n<\/p>\n

Critics point to a section of the bill that requires \u201cconsent before any state agency or political subdivision of this state makes a video or audio recording of the minor child.\u201d Videos may be made without consent only if they are part of a court proceeding, law enforcement investigation, criminal or other investigation, surveillance or a public event where the minor child has no reasonable expectation of privacy.\n<\/p>\n

Rep. John Shubeck, R-Beresford, said no exception is given for teachers who lead remote learning or assign video or audio projects. It also doesn\u2019t exclude coaches who use video to help their players improve.\n<\/p>\n

\u201cIt just concerns me that well-meaning teachers will get in trouble,\u201d Shubeck told the Searchlight. \u201cI like giving the parents the ability to monitor what their kids are being taught, I\u2019m just concerned about myself and others getting inadvertently swept up into breaking the law.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

The attempt to pass Senate Bill 190 comes amid concerns that school districts across the nation have policies in place that\u00a0allow children to transition socially\u00a0at school without their parents\u2019 consent, even allowing teachers to hide such information from parents.\n<\/p>\n

Earlier this week, the U.S. Supreme Court\u00a0ruled against\u00a0a California policy requiring teachers to withhold information from parents, allowing a federal judge\u2019s injunction against the state\u2019s requirement to take effect after an appeals court put the injunction on hold.\n<\/p>\n

Last year, the high court\u00a0sided\u00a0with parents who were prevented by their local Maryland school district from opting their children out of LGBT-related school curriculum.\n<\/p>\n

States that have passed a parents\u2019 bill of rights similar to Senate Bill 190 include\u00a0Indiana,\u00a0New Hampshire,\u00a0North Dakota,\u00a0Ohio,\u00a0Tennessee\u00a0and\u00a0West Virginia.\n<\/p>\n

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This article was originally published at The Christian Post. Photo Credit: Shubham Sharan on Unsplash.<\/em>
\n \n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Reading Time: 4 minutes Editor\u2019s note: Republican lawmakers struck down a parental rights bill in South Dakota, fearing it could potentially be used to enable abusive parents. Do you think this was the right decision? The Republican-controlled South Dakota House of Representatives rejected a wide-ranging parental rights bill on Tuesday that would have prevented public<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":21516,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[130,6275,1156,892,557,2734],"class_list":["post-21515","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-prayer","tag-bill","tag-legislators","tag-parental","tag-rights","tag-state","tag-strike"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21515","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=21515"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21515\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/21516"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=21515"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=21515"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=21515"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}