TALLAHASSEE, FLORIDA — Today, Florida House Rep. Adam Anderson (R-Palm Harbor) filed a new bill that would prohibit the teaching of sexual orientation or gender identity from pre-kindergarten through eighth grade. Florida’s current Parental Rights in Education law prohibits teaching these ideologies to students until the third grade.
HB 1223 would expand the law up to eighth grade and include specific guidelines for public schools on using gender-related pronouns throughout the twelfth grade.
The bill states that an employee, contractor, or student in K-12 public schools may not be required, as a condition of employment or enrollment in any program, to refer to another person using that person’s preferred personal title or pronouns if the pronouns do not correspond to that person’s sex.
In addition, employees in public schools would not be permitted to ask students for their preferred personal pronouns.
The Parental Rights in Education law was falsely labeled as the “Don’t Say Gay” law by critics and the legacy media. The bill itself does not mention the phrase “Don’t Say Gay” or even the word “gay” at all.
“Parents’ rights have been increasingly under assault around the nation, but in Florida we stand up for the rights of parents and the fundamental role they play in the education of their children,” said Governor Ron DeSantis when he signed the original bill in March 2022.
“Parents have every right to be informed about services offered to their child at school, and should be protected from schools using classroom instruction to sexualize their kids as young as 5 years old,” DeSantis added.
The proposed legislation would keep the current provisions prohibiting school districts from keeping information from parents. Schools must provide parental notification and involvement in critical decisions affecting a student’s mental, emotional, or physical health or well-being under the law.
