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      Trans youth fight for care as California clinics cave to Trump: ‘How can this happen here?’

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      Eli, a 16-year-old Los Angeles student, is spending his summer juggling an internship at a natural history museum, a research project, a physics class and cheer practice – and getting ready to apply for college.But in recent weeks, he has been forced to handle a more urgent matter: figuring out how he is going to access vital medical treatments targeted by the Trump administration.Last month, Eli was stunned to get an email alerting him that Children’s hospital Los Angeles (CHLA) was shutting down its Center for Transyouth Health and Development, which had provided him critical healthcare for three years. The center, which has served transgender youth for three decades, offered Eli counseling and helped him access gender-affirming hormone therapy that he said allowed him to live as himself and flourish in school.CHLA said it was shuttering the center due to the federal government’s threats to pull funding, part of the president’s efforts to eradicate trans youth healthcare. The move has forced Eli and his mother to scramble for alternatives, taking time out of his busy summer to contact new providers and ensure he doesn’t run out of medications.California became the first sanctuary state for trans youth healthcare in 2022 and has long positioned itself as having the strongest protections for LGBTQ+ children. Now, for families like Eli’s, it feels like that safety is rapidly disappearing.View image in fullscreen“I was always worried for people in conservative states and had a lot of fear for my community as a whole. But I never thought it would directly affect me in California,” Eli said on a recent afternoon, seated with his mom at a Latino LGBTQ+ organization in Boyle Heights. “I wish people understood they’re doing so much more harm than they could possibly imagine – that so many lives will be hurt and lost and so many people torn apart.”Eli is one of nearly 3,000 patients who learned on 12 June they would be abruptly losing their healthcare at CHLA, one of the largest and most prominent centers in the nation to treat trans kids. Then, on 24 June, Stanford Medicine revealed it had also paused gender-affirming surgeries for trans minors and 18-year-olds, with reports that some families had appointments suddenly canceled and leaving other patients fearful it was the beginning of a wider crackdown on their care.Families across California told the Guardian they were exploring options to stockpile hormones, researching how to get care outside the US, growing increasingly fearful that parents could face government investigations or prosecutions, and discussing options to permanently flee the country.CHLA, in a letter to staff, said its decision to close the trans center was “profoundly difficult”, but as California’s largest pediatric safety net provider, it could not risk losing federal dollars, which makes up a majority of its funds and would affect hundreds of thousands of patients. Stanford said its disruption in services followed a review of “directives from the federal government” and was done to “protect both our providers and patients”.“This is Los Angeles – how can this be happening here?” said Emily, Eli’s mother, who is an educator; the Guardian is identifying them by only their first names to protect their privacy. “My parents left their Central American countries for a better life – fleeing poverty and civil war, and I cannot believe I’m sitting here thinking: what would be the best country for my family to flee to, as so many immigrant families have done? I never thought I might have to leave the US to protect my son.”‘This care gave me my life’Katie, a 16-year-old film student who lives two hours outside Los Angeles, started going to CHLA for gender-affirming care in 2018 when she was nine. For several years, the care involved therapy and check-ins, but no direct medical interventions. Throughout that time, Katie was consistent about her identity as a girl, which CHLA providers supported.“It was so meaningful and incredible for them to say: ‘We see you for who you are, but also you can be who you are,’” recalled Katie, who asked to go by a pseudonym to protect her privacy. “It was like, I have a future. I’ll get to have my life.”In gender-affirming care, young children may first socially transition by using new names, pronouns and clothes. When youth are persistent about their gender, doctors can consider prescribing puberty blockers, which pause puberty, and eventually hormone therapies that allow for medical transition. Trans youth surgeries are rare.View image in fullscreenThe treatment has for years been considered the standard of care in the US, endorsed by major medical groups, including the American Academy of Pediatrics and the American Medical Association, and linked to improved mental health. In recent years, Republicans have passed bans on gender-affirming care in more than 25 states, and Trump has called the treatments “chemical and surgical mutilation”. There has also been a growing international backlash against the care, including in the UK, which has banned puberty blockers for trans kids.Last month, the US supreme court upheld Tennessee’s ban on gender-affirming care for trans youth. Families and civil rights groups have argued the bans are discriminatory, as cisgender children can still receive the same treatments; cis boys with delayed puberty may be prescribed testosterone, for example, while trans boys cannot.Katie, who was eventually prescribed puberty blockers and hormones, broke down crying recounting how the care saved her. “Sometimes I think: What would my life be if I never got this?” she said. “And I just don’t see myself here. I can’t see myself at 16 if I didn’t come out and transition … Losing this now would destroy my life.”Sage Sol Pitchenik, a 16-year-old CHLA patient, who is non-binary, said the care helped them overcome debilitating depression caused by their severe gender dysphoria: “Every day, I couldn’t even get up because I just didn’t want to see myself, not even my reflection in the window. I was so terrified to look at my body.”They compared the care to the essential treatment their twin brother had earlier received at the same institution: a liver transplant. “CHLA saved my life, just like they saved my brother,” they said.Eli, who came out as trans while in middle school during pandemic lockdowns, said it was hard to return to school when he felt so uncomfortable in his body. At the start of high school, he avoided making friends: “I’m really sociable. I love talking to people and joining clubs, but I felt restricted because of how embarrassed I felt and scared of how people would react to me.”The testosterone therapy helped restore his confidence, he said, recounting “euphoric moments” of his transition: growing facial hair, his voice deepening, staying in the boys’ cabin at camp. His friends celebrated each milestone, and his mom said the positive transformation was obvious to his whole family: “It was like day and night – we are a traditional Latino Catholic family, but they were all loving and accepting, because he is such a happier kid.”View image in fullscreen‘Treating our kids as disposable’CHLA started treating trans children around 1991, and that legacy was part of its appeal for parents. “It’s not just the best place in LA to get care, it’s also one of the most important research centers in the country,” said Jesse Thorn, a radio host who has two trans daughters receiving care there.Critics of gender-affirming care have claimed that vulnerable youth are rushed into transitioning without understanding treatment consequences, and that there is not enough research to justify the care. CHLA, Thorn said, countered those claims; families have appointments and build long-term relationships with doctors, psychologists, psychiatrists and social workers. The process is slow and methodical, and the center was engaged in extensive research on the effects of treatments, he said.“The youth most in danger with the clinic closing are those with parents who aren’t sure about this care,” Thorn added. “That’s a lot of parents. They’re not hateful bigots. They’re overwhelmed and scared, and the institution means a lot.”View image in fullscreenOne LA parent, who requested anonymity to protect her trans son’s privacy, said she knew parents who traveled from Idaho to get CHLA’s care: “It really was a beacon of the entire western United States. It is a remarkable loss.”Parents told the Guardian that they were putting their children on waitlists at other clinics and beginning intake processes, but remained worried for families who have public health insurance and fewer resources.Like CHLA, Stanford has long researched and championed trans youth healthcare. The prestigious university’s recent pullback on care only affects surgeries, which are much more rare than hormone therapy and puberty blockers. But families whose care has remained intact, for now, say they are on edge.“There’s a constant feeling of not knowing what you need to prepare for,” said one mom of a 17-year-old trans boy, who said her son waited six months to first be seen by Stanford. “We all understand the pressures the doctors and institutions are under. But ceding the surgeries doesn’t mean the pressure will end. It’s just showing us our kids are seen as disposable.”Parents and advocates say they fear that other institutions could follow CHLA and Stanford, particularly as the White House significantly escalates attacks in ways that go far beyond funding threats.Fears of prosecutionTrump’s focus on California trans youth and gender-affirming care has been relentless. The president has directly attacked a 16-year-old trans track runner, with the US justice department and federal Department of Education fighting, so far unsuccessfully, to force the state’s schools to ban trans female athletes and bar trans girls from women’s facilities. Trump has threatened to withhold billions of dollars in education funding over a state law meant to prevent schools from forcibly outing LGBTQ+ youth to their parents.Perhaps most troubling for families and providers, the FBI has said it is investigating providers who “mutilate” children “under the guise of gender-affirming care”, and the DoJ said this week it had issued subpoenas to trans youth clinics and doctors.This has led to growing fears that the US will seek to prosecute and imprison clinicians, similar to efforts by some Republican states to criminally charge abortion providers. Many parents say they worry they could be targeted next.“There’s an outcry of terror,” said another LA mother of a trans child. “It feels like there is a bloodlust to jail any doctor who has ever helped an LGBTQ+ kid. There’s this realization that the world is constricting around us, and that any moment they could be coming for us.”Some families hope that California will fight back, but are wary of how committed the governor, Gavin Newsom, really is. Newsom faced widespread backlash in March when he hosted a podcast with a conservative activist and said he agreed with the suggestion that trans girls participating in sports was “deeply unfair”.California’s department of justice, meanwhile, has repeatedly emphasized that when institutions withhold gender-affirming care for trans youth, they are violating the state’s anti-discrimination laws.A spokesperson for Rob Bonta, the state’s attorney general, said Trump was “seeking to scare doctors and hospitals from providing nondiscriminatory healthcare”: “The bottom line is: this care remains legal in California … While we are concerned with the recent decisions by CHLA, right now we are focused on getting to the source of this problem – and that’s the Trump administration’s unlawful and harmful threats to providers.”A CHLA spokesperson shared a copy of its staff letter, noting that Trump’s threats to its funding came from at least five federal departments, and saying it was working with patients to identify alternative care and would “explore” reassigning affected employees to other roles. A Stanford spokesperson did not answer questions about how many patients were affected by its recent changes, but said in an email it was “committed to providing high quality, thorough and compassionate medical services for every member of our community”.Kush Desai, a White House spokesperson, said in an email that Trump has a “resounding mandate” to end “unproven, irreversible child mutilation procedures”, adding: “The administration is delivering.”Katie’s mother said she expected the state’s leaders to do more: “The quiet from the governor and others on trans rights is very unsettling. My husband and I grew up in California, went to public schools here, and always thought we’d be safe here and that the state would hold the line. It’s hard to tell right now if that’s true.”Izzy Gardon, Newsom’s spokesperson, defended the governor, saying in an email that his “record supporting the trans community is unmatched”.“Everyone wants to blame Gavin Newsom for everything. But instead of indulging in Newsom-derangement syndrome, maybe folks should look to Washington.”‘We can’t be quiet’Affected youth are increasingly speaking out. Since the news broke, protesters have organized weekly demonstrations in front of CHLA to call for the healthcare to be restored.At one recent evening rally, organized by the LA LGBT Center, families and supporters marched and chanted outside the busy hospital on Sunset Boulevard, holding signs saying “Trans joy is resistance” and “blood on your hands”, and at one point shouting: “Down with erasure, down with hate, shame on CHLA!”View image in fullscreen“We can’t be quiet any more. We’ve been polite for too long and taken so much bullshit from people who hate us,” said Sage, who spoke at an earlier rally. “I didn’t stand up just for myself or the people affected by this, but also for the trans people who came before us who still have incorrect names on their graves, who don’t have a voice.” Sage, who is now in a creative writing program, said they hoped to become a journalist.Katie, who aspires to be a television writer in LA, said she could not be silent as anti-trans advocates force families to consider fleeing: “How dare you try to drive me out of the place where I was born, where my best friends are, where the job I want to do is, where I’ve experienced my whole life? This is my home.”Eli said he didn’t feel as if he was being an activist. He was simply asking for the “bare minimum”: to be left alone and able to access basic healthcare. “Trans services like hormone therapy truly saves lives,” he said. “We just want people to be able to live their lives. I’m just asking for what is commonsense.” More

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      California bishop excuses weekly mass obligation amid immigration raids

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      Alberto Rojas, the San Bernardino bishop who leads more than 1.5 million Catholics in southern California, has formally excused parishioners from their weekly obligation to attend mass following immigration detentions on two parish properties in the diocese.The dispensation is a move usually reserved for extenuating circumstances, such as the height of the Covid-19 pandemic. But Rojas says it is necessary because of the fear of being apprehended and possibly deported that has gripped communities, including Catholic churches.“There is a real fear gripping many in our parish communities that if they venture out into any kind of public setting they will be arrested by immigration officers,” said Rojas in a statement on Wednesday.“Sadly, that includes attending Mass. The recent apprehension of individuals at two of our Catholic parishes has only intensified that fear. I want our immigrant communities to know that their Church stands with them and walks with them through this trying time.”Save for a serious reason, Catholics are obligated by their faith to attend mass on Sundays and holy days of obligation. In May, the diocese of Nashville in Tennessee issued a similar statement following immigration enforcement actions in the area, excusing those who were fearful of attending mass from their holy obligation, though it was not named as a formal dispensation.Rojas is an immigrant himself. He was born and raised in Aguascalientes, Mexico. He has been consistent in his support of immigrants and said when he assumed this role that it would be one of his top priorities.Last month, as federal agents made arrests and the federal government deployed the national guard to maintain order amid protests in Los Angeles, Rojas issued a statement calling out federal agents entering parish properties and “seizing several people”, creating an environment of fear, confusion and anxiety.“It is not of the Gospel of Jesus Christ – which guides us in all that we do,” he said. “I ask all political leaders and decision-makers to please reconsider these tactics immediately in favor of an approach that respects human rights and human dignity and builds toward a more lasting, comprehensive reform of our immigration system.”The diocese, which was created in 1978, serves more than 1.5 million Catholics in Riverside county, which is 52.5% Latino and San Bernardino county, which is 56.4% Latino, according to the 2020 US census.Members of local parishes who are in the US without documents have made positive contributions to their communities “with no other issues than their legal status”, the bishop said.“Most of them are here because they wanted to save their families; they had no other option. I believe that they would love to be legalized, but who can help them?”Rojas said he knows these people would be in church but for the threat to their safety and their family unity.“With all the worry and anxiety that they are feeling I wanted to take away, for a time, the burden they may be feeling from not being able to fulfill this commitment to which our Catholic faithful are called,” Rojas said.Pastor Omar Coronado with Inland Congregations United for Change, a faith-based non-profit serving Riverside and San Bernardino counties, called the bishop’s decree “an extraordinary act of moral courage and pastoral care”.At a time when so many families are living in fear and uncertainty, the Bishop’s voice offers not just protection but hope,” he said in a statement. “We’re deeply grateful for his leadership in reminding us that faith is not meant to hide behind walls, but to stand with the vulnerable.”The diocese of San Bernardino is the nation’s fifth-largest Catholic diocese and second-largest in California next to the archdiocese of Los Angeles, which is the largest in the country with about 5 million members. Neither the Los Angeles archdiocese nor the neighboring diocese of Orange, which serves about 1.3 million Catholics, has issued similar dispensations.A spokesperson for the diocese of Orange said they have in recent weeks taken steps to support the immigrant community, including asking priests to bring communion and celebrate mass in the homes of those who are fearful of going outside. The diocese has also shared protocols with parishes and Catholic schools to help them prepare and respond properly to the presence of immigration officials on church or school grounds, he said. In addition, the diocese is also coordinating efforts to have priests and deacons accompany and spiritually support people at immigration court hearings.Parishes under the archdiocese of Los Angeles are also continuing to “provide outreach to families and individuals that have been impacted”, a spokesperson for the archdiocese said. More

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      Trump sues California over transgender athletes in girls’ school sports

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      The Trump administration has sued California over its policies allowing transgender athletes to compete in girls’ school sports, alleging that their participation violates federal anti-discrimination laws.The lawsuit, filed in federal court in Los Angeles, claims that California’s policies violate Title IX, which affords legal protection against sex discrimination.Pam Bondi, the US attorney general, in a statement took aim at Gavin Newsom, California’s governor and a Trump antagonist seen as a potential Democratic presidential candidate in 2028. Newsom in a March podcast interview with the rightwing activist Charlie Kirk called transgender participation in girls’ sports “deeply unfair”.“Not only is it ’deeply unfair,’ it is also illegal under federal law,” Bondi said in a statement. “This Department of Justice will continue its fight to protect equal opportunities for women and girls in sports.”A spokesperson for Newsom did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Trump, a Republican, has signed a series of executive orders restricting transgender rights, including a February directive to strip federal funding for any school that allows transgender women or girls to compete in female sports.The suit comes weeks after the education department announced it had found California allegedly violated the law by permitting trans girls to compete on girls’ sports teams, and proposed that the state strip trans athletes of their records and awards and bar trans women from competing in women’s sports.California has allowed trans girls to compete in girls’ sports for more than a decade – a policy that attracted little outcry until Republicans and anti-LGBTQ+ groups seized on the issue in recent years.The justice department under Trump has already filed a similar lawsuit against Maine and has made challenging transgender rights a major civil rights priority. The lawsuit alleges that state policies “ignore undeniable biological differences between boys and girls” and diminish the integrity of girls’ sports. Advocates for LGBTQ+ rights have said transgender athletes comprise a small minority of all school athletes and bans on their participation further stigmatize a vulnerable population.California’s policies drew national attention earlier this year when a transgender girl competing in the state track and field championship won the high jump and triple jump and finished second in the long jump, an episode cited in the justice department’s complaint. Ahead of that competition, the governing board for California high school sports had announced it would change the rules to allow more girls to take part.The athlete who won, 16-year-old AB Hernandez, was subjected to harassment from anti-LGBTQ+ activists and targeted by the president himself who said that her participation was “demeaning” to women and girls and said he was “ordering local authorities, if necessary, to not allow” her to participate.In an interview with the Guardian, Hernandez said that despite the criticism, she had the support of her classmates. “They see how hard I train,” she said. One of her competitors told the San Francisco Chronicle: “Sharing the podium was nothing but an honor.”The Trump administration lawsuit cites five alleged instances of transgender athletes taking part in girls’ school sporting events in a state with nearly 6 million public school students, according to state data.It seeks a court order barring any school under the California Interscholastic Federation from allowing transgender athletes to take part in girls’ sports competitions and to establish a process to compensate female athletes it alleges have been harmed by the state’s policy.Newsom has repeatedly clashed with Trump, most recently over the president’s decision to deploy national guard troops to Los Angeles, California’s largest city, to quell anti-deportation protests that erupted after the Trump administration carried out workplace raids in the city.The feud has prompted several legal battles between the Trump administration and the largest US state. The justice department under Trump has already launched an investigation into hiring practices at the University of California system and has sued Los Angeles over policies restricting the city’s cooperation with federal immigration enforcement.Newsom sued the Trump administration over the national guard deployment. More

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      It was a milestone for progressive education in California. Then it unraveled

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      View image in fullscreenIt was celebrated at the time as a major milestone for progressive education. In 2021, California became the first state to make ethnic studies a graduation requirement, mandating all high schools teach the subject by fall 2025.The idea, championed by California’s governor, Gavin Newsom, was to bring modern concepts into the classroom. At its core, ethnic studies, an academic discipline born on California campuses during the civil rights movement, elevates the experiences of historically marginalized groups. Its materials push students to question their biases, reimagine power structures, and think critically about the enduring legacies of colonialism. In California high schools, courses would bring to the fore the experiences of Chicano, Black and Indigenous communities in the state by diving into issues such as gentrification, the impact of pesticides on farm worker communities and the legacies of Indian boarding schools. Many school districts enthusiastically jumped on board.The idea to make ethnic studies part of the curriculum always had its detractors. But it gained significant support after the racial justice protests of 2020. Today, however, ideas that rose to the vanguard of American culture after that period’s uprising have fallen dramatically out of political favor, and ethnic studies is now the center of an acrimonious battle over what constitutes antisemitism – and whether students should be learning about international conflicts, namely the fraught histories of Israel and Palestine – in courses meant to lift up the diverse experiences of Californians. The controversy has resulted in lawsuits and threats to ban certain concepts and materials entirely.In a dramatic heel turn, state legislators earlier this year proposed a bill that would have significantly restricted how the subject could be taught. While the effort faltered, Newsom has since withheld the funding needed for the new course requirement to go into effect by the fall deadline, potentially propelling the initiative toward anticlimactic collapse. In some cases, districts are reeling initiatives back of their own accord; last week San Francisco unified school district announced it would pause the development of its own ethnic studies curriculum following complaints from parents that the material was too progressive.The saga underscores how deeply politics have infiltrated schools, even in a liberal state like California. It also has illuminated a gaping chasm in worldviews that is playing out nationally: what one side views as inclusivity the other views as leftwing indoctrination, and neither side appears willing to compromise. In the crosshairs are American public schools.California is the birthplace of ethnic studies as a discipline.In the late 1960s, as student protests roiled much of the world, students of color at San Francisco State University launched the longest student strike in US history to protest what they viewed as Eurocentrism in education. Among their demands was the establishment of ethnic studies departments that would give voice to marginalized groups.View image in fullscreenThe field’s interdisciplinary philosophies would come to be embraced by universities nationwide, and ethnic studies departments were established at a host of college campuses, including in more conservative states. After the racial reckoning of 2020 that came out of the murder of George Floyd, ideas previously reserved for the halls of universities and the pages of academic books – such as postcolonial theory and intersectionality – entered the public conscience.While 24 states have incorporated some elements of ethnic studies into their K-12 curricula, California lawmakers stand alone in having mandated it as a graduation requirement. In some ways, the most diverse state in the nation, where 60% of the population are people of color, was a natural fit for the requirement. But in hindsight, it’s not clear whether lawmakers understood the radical nature of the concepts they legislated into public school curricula.The policy’s rollout has been rife with disagreements from the beginning, stemming in large part from a spirit of flexibility that has made for murky guidelines.The law required California high schools to have a course available by the fall of 2025 and stated that to graduate, members of the class of 2030 would need a one-semester ethnic studies course on their transcript. That course could take a number of forms, depending on the school’s structure, resources and priorities, explained Tricia Gallagher-Geurtsen, an ethnic studies lecturer at the University of San Diego. A school can write its own course based on the state’s model curriculum or use one that has been pre-approved by the University of California system. And while most ethnic studies classes are categorized as history or English courses, there is nothing to stop a school from designating a math course as its ethnic studies prerequisite. “It could be a statistics course that looks into measuring racial inequities,” Gallagher-Geurtsen said.Ultimately, legislators left the development of curricula up to individual schools and teachers who weren’t necessarily trained in ethnic studies, which is a discipline with strict theoretical parameters. This lack of clarity has resulted in experimentation, disagreement and, in some cases, heated animosity, on the ground.In 2019, before the subject was made mandatory, the state released its first draft of an ethnic studies model curriculum that teachers could voluntarily incorporate or adapt for local school board approval. The model text, which was created with input from an 18-member committee of hired academic experts from universities around California, focused on the four populations considered by ethnic studies experts to be the driving force of the discipline in the US: Black, Chicano and Latino, Asian American and Pacific Islander, and American Indian and Native American.View image in fullscreen“This is how ethnic studies categorizes itself,” explained Gallagher-Geurtsen. “[It] centers racialized groups of color first.”Different groups were upset about it for various reasons, but there was recurring protest over the model text’s representation of Israel as a colonial oppressor state: a characterization that academics in the field say is central to ethnic studies as a discipline. That drew protests from Jewish groups that criticized the material’s failure to address antisemitism. Rightwing advocacy organizations also accused the text of promoting a leftwing agenda grounded in critical race theory, objecting, for example, to its claim that the “war on drugs” was fundamentally racist.The curriculum was ultimately rejected by the California board of education, and a new committee was brought in to draft more politically palatable guidelines that were “free of bias”.When that happened, Ndindi Kitonga, an ethnic studies lecturer at California State University, Long Beach and founder of an alternative school in Los Angeles, grew concerned that the new panel lacked direction from experts trained in the academic discipline. She wanted to make sure that the guidelines sent to classrooms reflected topics that are fundamental to the academic field – such as resistance to oppression and solidarity across social movements – rather than the priorities of policymakers. On those points, the discipline cannot compromise, Kitonga and other ethnic studies scholars emphasized.So Kitonga, along with fellow academics and activists in the field, decided to make material of their own for teachers to use. Independent of the state, they designed sample ethnic studies lesson plans for teachers to access free of charge online. The lessons are organized into units themed around the four groups of focus, and primarily focus on teaching hyper-local histories. Students are encouraged to learn about how phenomena such as gentrification have unfolded in their own neighborhoods, for instance, and to visit local archives.But the materials also make connections between the experiences of marginalized groups in America and those of oppressed groups around the globe, including Palestinians.In a slide from a model lesson plan focused on contemporary Arab American identities and experiences, for instance, images showing the loss of land belonging to Indigenous groups in the US is pictured alongside images showing shrinking Palestinian territory in the century that followed the 1917 Balfour Declaration, through which Britain voiced support for the establishment of a Jewish state in the region. Students are invited to draw comparisons between the two histories.View image in fullscreenKitonga and her colleagues called the initiative the Liberated Ethnic Studies Model Curriculum Consortium – “liberated”, that is, from legislators’ interests.The response from teachers in the two dozen districts that have adopted curricula designed by the consortium has been positive, said Gallagher-Geurtsen, who helped found the consortium. “It affirms who students are and recognizes their experiences in a deeper way than any curriculum ever has,” she said. “Teachers have said it’s the most rewarding teaching they’ve ever done in their lives.”Research shows that teaching ethnic studies raises grades and test scores for students of all backgrounds across all subjects, increases graduation rates, and improves relations and understanding across races and ethnicities. And for Kitonga, the controversy distracts from those benefits.“That’s never talked about in the news,” she said.Instead, headlines have been drawn to accusations of antisemitism in ethnic studies classrooms.Across the state, groups of concerned parents have sued school districts, alleging that teachers have exposed students to antisemitic material and ideas in ethnic studies lessons that characterize Israel’s actions towards Palestine as an example of colonial oppression and genocide. While these accusations predated the Hamas attacks of 7 October 2023 and Israel’s subsequent bombing campaigns in Gaza, the frequency and intensity of tensions have mounted since.In LA, parents lost a suit claiming that teachers who identified as Zionist felt unwelcome in ethnic studies classrooms; in San Jose, an ongoing suit alleges that an ethnic studies teacher characterized Jews and Israelis as oppressors and “exploitative capitalists”, leading Jewish students to be be ostracized and harassed; and in Santa Ana, the school district settled with Jewish parents and community members who claimed to have been deliberately excluded from public discussions in which curricula were developed and approved – a violation of the state’s Brown Act, which demands open legislative meetings.View image in fullscreenRachel Lerman, vice-chair of the Louis D Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law, which filed claims on behalf of plaintiffs in the Santa Ana and Sequoia cases, claims that parents in Santa Ana were refused access to class materials after directly approaching schools and teachers, and that school board members considered holding meetings on Passover, a major Jewish holiday, so that Jewish community members could not attend.Lerman said the deliberate exclusion of the Jewish community from civic discourse is both antisemitic and directly harms Jewish kids. “It leads to bullying of Jewish students, to the exclusion of Jewish students from school clubs,” she said, adding that she had spoken with many Jewish parents who have elected to take their children out of local public schools, citing antisemitism.But advocates – as well as school districts and even courts – have pushed back, arguing that criticizing power structures, including foreign governments, drives ethnic studies and is not discriminatory. Last year, a Palo Alto school district rejected parents’ claims that its ethnic studies course was politically radical, while a judge threw out the case brought against LA ethnic studies educators on the grounds that “learning about Israel and Palestine” does not constitute “injury”.Teachers have pushed back, too. In April, Chloe Gentile-Montgomery, a Bay Area ethnic studies teacher who was placed on leave for allegedly including antisemitic material in a slideshow concerning Israel and Palestine, sued her former school district. Gentile-Montgomery claims racial discrimination and failure on the part of her employer to protect her from harassment from students and parents. While other teachers in the district taught about Israel and Palestine without consequence, Gentile-Montgomery, who is Black, was “singled out” and targeted, according to the lawsuit.Asserting that she has seen no convincing evidence of prejudice levied against ethnic studies educators, Gallagher-Geurtsen said that these incidents are examples of antisemitism being conflated with criticisms against a foreign government – with the latter being a perfectly acceptable exercise for high schoolers to undertake, she said.“Curriculum that makes you feel uncomfortable does not violate your rights,” she said.In some ways, the fight against ethnic studies is a story very specific to California. In others, it’s a microcosm of trends playing out on a national stage: polarization, censorship, and a cultural and political retreat from progressive ideas, especially in education.Those divisions have only been exacerbated since the war in Gaza and Donald Trump’s return to office. Since the 7 October attacks, the US Department of Education has investigated at least 40 K-12 schools for discrimination and antisemitism. Under Trump, the assault on educational institutions has escalated dramatically with antisemitism investigations against dozens of universities and a dramatic campaign against the academic independence of schools such as Harvard and Columbia.In California, a group of state lawmakers have tried to address what they describe as an unbridled course mandate that has given teachers too much leeway, paving the way for antisemitism to enter the classroom.“School districts have proceeded with content that isn’t appropriate for all kids and [that is] antisemitic,” said assembly member Rick Chavez Zbur.Zbur and fellow assembly member Dawn Addis co-authored Assembly Bill 1468, which proposed more stringent oversight over how the subject would be taught and the restriction of material to “domestic” experiences. The bill was pulled by its authors last month and replaced with a new bill focused on targeting antisemitism in schools.Zbur, a Democrat, is adamant that his critiques and policy aims have nothing to do with events at the national level. “This is completely separate,” he said. “I wouldn’t even put this in the bucket of things that the federal administration is focusing on.”Academics and policy experts see things differently. To them, ethnic studies is becoming another flashpoint term with academic origins – not unlike critical race theory (CRT) – being used to quash the teaching of subjects like colonialism and racism.“It’s using the language of civil rights to go against civil rights,” said Rachel Perera, a fellow at the Brown Center on Education Policy at the Brookings Institution. “It all seems very similar to trends we’ve seen nationally.”Ben Olinsky, senior vice-president of structural reform and governance at the Center for American Progress, echoed her point. “You have to view all this within a much broader push to censor opposing voices by Trump and folks on the right.”The ethnic studies drama also builds on trends that first emerged during pandemic-era lockdowns and the racial reckoning that followed the murder of George Floyd. Many parents saw what their children were learning in school over Zoom and were unhappy about the content. Rightwing politicians have seized on this, turning what began as local cultural disagreements into a “parents’ rights” movement that seeks to mute the discussion of certain topics – such as race and gender – in schools.“Rightwing groups have a stranglehold on our electeds,” said Gallagher-Geurtsen, claiming the California lawsuits were the product of a rightwing political engine intent on quashing free speech and weakening anti-racist efforts. “This is precisely the moment to step up and show white nationalists that they will not win.”When it comes to the Jewish parents’ antisemitism allegations, she rejects them out of hand. “Are you referring to white supremacist folks who don’t want us talking about race and racism?” she asked.Lerman, who represents Jewish families in several lawsuits, paints a very different picture – one in which progressive parents who want to protect their kids from harassment are being cornered and maligned as hateful racists. In reference to parents who have moved schools as a result of the conflict, she said: “These are liberals who went to live there because they believed in living in a diverse society, because they’ve upheld civil rights for so long, and suddenly their children are being bullied and humiliated and put in a position that’s just untenable,” she said.It is unclear whether there is a middle ground in this battle of opposing worldviews, where each side is convinced the other is perpetuating harmful and discriminatory ideas.The result of such rancor is that the quality of public education goes down, experts say. Teachers, fearing retribution, are silenced or leave the profession entirely; parents with means move their kids to private schools; and school districts see much-needed funding disappear. “These events are going to shape how educators talk about and teach these topics that they know are politically contentious,” said Perera.Perera thinks that the dissolution of America’s public school system, which shapes the minds of 80% of the nation’s K-12 students, is a goal of the Trump administration’s war on education. “That’s the endgame: to dismantle the public education system by sowing distrust and creating poor experiences.”Experts also fear that the infighting and its focus on Israeli politics distracts from what they see as a very real, and growing, threat of antisemitism, especially on the right. “It is really hard to take Trump and his administration seriously on this issue when one of his senior advisers gave a Nazi salute and they seek to weaponize the label of antisemitism to silence protected free speech on campuses,” said Olinsky.Added Kitonga: “Antisemitism is a real and scary phenomenon. Coming for ethnic studies will not resolve any bit of it.” More

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      ‘I want my vote back’: Trump-voting family stunned after Canadian mother detained over immigration status

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      The family of a Canadian national who supported Donald Trump’s plans for mass deportations of immigrants say they are feeling betrayed after federal agents recently detained the woman in California while she interviewed for permanent US residency – and began working to expel her from the country.“We feel totally blindsided,” Cynthia Olivera’s husband – US citizen and self-identified Trump voter Francisco Olivera – told the California news station KGTV. “I want my vote back.”Cynthia Olivera, a 45-year-old mother of three US-born children, thus joined a growing list of examples contradicting the Trump administration’s claims that the immigration crackdown it has spearheaded since the president’s return to the Oval Office in January has prioritized targeting dangerous criminals.Being in the US without legal status is generally a civil infraction rather than a criminal violation. Nonetheless, despite its claim that the immigration crackdown is mainly meant to rid the US of violent criminals, the White House has maintained that anyone in the US who lacks legal status is a criminal subject to deportationOlivera was unwittingly thrust under the weight of those policies after Trump spent his successful 2024 presidential campaign promising to pursue them, earning her husband’s vote along the way, according to what he told KGTV. She was just 10 when her parents brought her to the US from Toronto without permission, she said to the station.By 1999, US immigration officials at the Buffalo border crossing had determined Olivera was living in the country without legal status and obtained an expedited order to deport her. But she was able to return to the US by driving to San Diego from Mexico within a few months.“They didn’t ask me for my citizenship – they didn’t do nothing,” Olivera would later say to KGTV. “They just waved me in.”She recounted spending the next 25 years working in Los Angeles, paying taxes and providing for her family. KGVT reported that its investigative team scoured California and federal court databases, but the unit found no criminal charges under Cynthia Oliver’s name.In 2024, toward the end of his presidency, Joe Biden’s administration granted her a permit allowing her to work legally in the US. She had also been navigating the process to obtain legal permanent US residency – colloquially referred to as a green card – for years.Nonetheless, instead of supporting the candidate Biden endorsed to succeed him, then vice-president Kamala Harris, Olivera’s husband supported Trump in November’s White House election. He told KGTV that Trump’s promises to deport criminals en masse appealed to both him and Cynthia. And, echoing other mixed immigration status families who have had members affected by Trump’s policies, the Oliveras did not believe she would be hurt by her lack of legal US residency.They learned she would in fact be affected by her immigration status when she went for a green card interview in Chatsworth, California, on 13 June. She was detained there by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) agents, according to a change.org petition pleading for compassion on behalf of Cynthia.Olivera has since been transferred to an Ice detention center in El Paso, Texas, to await being deported.Speaking to KGTV over a video call from the El Paso facility, Olivera suggested her treatment was undeserved.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotion“The US is my country,” Olivera remarked to the station in an interview published on 3 July. “That’s where I met my husband. That’s where I went to high school, junior high, elementary [school]. That’s where I had my kids.”But the Trump administration had little sympathy for Olivera, despite her husband’s support of the president, with a spokesperson saying in a statement that Cynthia was “an illegal alien from Canada”.Olivera had been “previously deported and chose to ignore our law and again illegally entered the country”, said the spokesperson’s statement, as reported by Newsweek. The statement noted that re-entering the US without permission after being deported is a felony, and it said Olivera would remain in Ice’s custody “pending removal to Canada”.Canada’s government commented to KGTV that it was aware of Olivera’s detention but could not intervene on her behalf because “every country or territory decides who can enter or exit through its borders”.Francisco Olivera, for his part, summed up his and his wife’s disillusion by saying: “My wife … up until [a couple of weeks] ago, was a strong believer in what was going to happen the next four years.”Cynthia Olivera, meanwhile, said she has told officials she and her husband are willing to pay for her to fly to Canada, where she plans to stay in Mississauga with a cousin. Yet there had been no immediate indication when she may be able to travel to Canada.As she fought back tears, Olivera said to KGTV: “The only crime I committed is to love this country and to work hard and to provide for my kids.” More

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      ‘Harvey would say, we’re on the brink’: why conservatives are coming for a gay rights hero

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      As San Francisco’s pride festivities came to a close last week, a cloud hung over the otherwise joyful celebrations as the city’s LGBTQ+ community learned that the US government had stripped a naval ship of its name honoring the gay rights pioneer Harvey Milk.Donald Trump’s defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, claimed the action showed the administration’s commitment to “taking the politics” out of military naming conventions. San Francisco’s queer community saw things differently.For many, the move was yet another example of Trump taking a swipe at progressive values. To others, the decision to remove Milk’s name from the frigate represented something more sinister: an intention, on the part of an emboldened administration, to take the LGBTQ+ community out of public view and to strike their accomplishments from the historical record.“On its own, it is not the most significant offense that we’ve witnessed in the past six months,” said Marc Stein, a professor of history at San Francisco State University who researches sexuality and politics. “But when combined with so many other things, it sends a powerful message.”Hegseth’s announcement is the latest attack on Milk’s legacy from conservatives in California and on the national stage. In 2023, the southern California city of Temecula made news when its school board attempted to remove references to Milk from elementary school textbooks. Before that, it was revealed that Tucker Carlson, while a college student, had apparently been connected to a society celebrating Milk’s murderer.Since Trump took office, the rollback of LGBTQ+ rights and visibility has only accelerated, from a directive to purge the military of transgender service members, to a supreme court decision allowing K-12 students to opt out of reading materials with LGBTQ+ themes.Taken together, LGBTQ+ advocates and community members fear that much of the progress made to secure their rights since Milk’s assassination in 1978 is in peril.“The renaming of the ship is part of a broader pattern wherein the Trump administration and its allies are trying to roll back the advances of the last several decades,” said Stein.At the Cinch Saloon, a historic gay bar in San Francisco’s Castro district, June’s Pride month celebrations were held against a backdrop of conversations about the fate of the community. Bartender Eric Berchtold expressed fear that the administration is working up to rescind the right to same-sex marriage. “It’s blatant malice,” Berchtold said. “They want to erase us and eradicate our history like we don’t exist.”Suzanne Ford, executive director of San Francisco Pride, said that fears of rolling back progress have been felt most acutely by older members of the community who were part of the gay liberation movement in the 1960s and 70s.View image in fullscreenAmong those affected people are Cleve Jones, an activist and friend of Milk’s who worked in Milk’s office when he was city supervisor. “I can remember when we were criminalized, when we were routinely beaten and fired, when you could not have a job if you were known to be gay,” said Jones.When Milk was elected as city supervisor in 1977, he was the country’s first openly gay politician. Two decades prior, he had been forced to resign from the navy due to his sexuality.That’s why publicly displaying Milk’s name on a military vessel represents much more than a public gesture, explained Craig Loftin, professor of American studies at California State University, Fullerton and a scholar of LGBTQ+ history. “In the big-picture history of LGBTQ people, the quest for public visibility and recognition is at the core and center of that narrative,” he said.“[Milk] was a leader in this idea of not hiding in the shadows.”A swinging pendulumThat isn’t to say that the quest for gay liberation has been linear.While the gay liberation movement made enormous strides on the fronts of decriminalization and visibility in the 1960s and 70s, the rise of the religious right as a powerful political bloc in the 80s paused progress. That coincided with the onset of the Aids pandemic, which devastated gay communities across the country – nowhere more acutely than in San Francisco. In response to silence on the part of the federal government and the Reagan administration, a new wave of activism was spurred that demanded research into treatment and condemned homophobic discrimination.“It’s waxed and waned,” said Loftin. “It took several years before we had activist groups like Aact Up channeling their rage in a strategic, focused way that yielded significant results and moved gay culture further than where it had been,” Loftin said. In the decades that followed, the community saw same-sex marriage legalized, the military’s “Don’t ask don’t tell” policy repealed, and, most recently, a surge of visibility for trans Americans. “There is a pendulum quality to a lot of history, but especially LGBT history.”Knowing this, Loftin is hopeful that the community will come together and fight back with vigor. “My optimistic thought is that because they’re hitting us so hard and so fast, the pendulum will swing back the other direction, hopefully harder and faster,” he said. “[Trump] is awakening a dragon.”View image in fullscreenBerchtold, the Cinch Saloon bartender, said he saw a lot more activism among patrons today than he did when he started working at the bar 22 years ago.Jones is more fearful. To him, there is a gulf between an older generation that remembers the traumas of past decades, and a younger cohort that takes the advances for granted.“Younger ones never watched everyone they knew die,” said Jones. “I carry those memories with me as I interact daily with young people who are completely oblivious to that reality.”‘Everything feels very fragile’To Stein and others, what is most jarring about the renaming of USNS Harvey Milk is that it lifts the veil on which groups the administration plans to target. Until now, policy decisions have primarily focused on restricting the rights of trans Americans – which advocates say has had the effect of making cisgender members of the LGBTQ+ community complacent.“It is a lie that the administration is only going after trans people,” said Stein. “They are especially targeting trans people … but [cis] gay and lesbian people should not feel like they are going to be safe from what’s happening.”Jones echoed: “There is a significant number of gay and lesbian men and women who may think this is going to stop with trans people. That’s just foolishness.”View image in fullscreenAdvocates and scholars also see attacks on the LGBTQ+ community as connected to the administration’s larger ambitions to curb civil liberties, including those of women and immigrants.“There is going to be great variation depending on … where you live,” said Stein, drawing a thread between disparities in access to gender-affirming care, abortion rights and immigrant protections. “Those of us who are in San Francisco and California are protected in some respects from the worst of what’s going on, but we also live in a nation with a powerful federal government.“Everything is very fragile at this moment,” added Ford. “You can’t take for granted that they’re not going to try to take your rights.”Jones says that if he were alive today, Harvey Milk would agree. A Jewish American who came of age during the second world war, he would have seen the government’s actions as indicative of an unhealthy democracy and sounded the alarm.“He would say, ‘Watch out. We are on the brink. It is happening again. It is unfolding all around us.’” More

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      Stanford University will cut $140m from its budget, citing ‘federal policy changes’

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      Stanford University will cut $140m from its budget in the coming academic year, citing “consequences from federal policy changes” including “reductions in federal research support and an increase in the endowment tax”. The news came in a letter Jon Levin, the university president, and Jenny Martinez, the provost, sent to faculty and staff last week.The budget cuts will likely necessitate staff layoffs, deepening the impact of a staff hiring freeze the university announced in February. The university will continue hiring faculty, “although the pace may be somewhat slowed”, Levin and Martinez wrote. The cuts exclude the School of Medicine, which will make its own budget reductions.“We believe deeply in the value of universities, in federal support for basic research, and in the endowment model that underpins financial aid and graduate fellowships. We will continue to advocate for these things,” Levin and Martinez said. “At the same time, we need to be realistic about the current landscape and its consequences.”Stanford has been hit particularly hard by federal changes to research grants and a proposed endowment tax.The university has lost millions of dollars in federal grants this year, according to databases tracking cuts to National Institutes of Health and National Science Foundation grants maintained by Noam Ross of rOpenSci and Scott Delaney of the Harvard T H Chan School of Public Health.The university would also keenly feel the impact of an endowment tax such as that proposed by Donald Trump’s “big, beautiful bill.” The House of Representatives has passed a version of the president’s budget which would levy a 21% tax on schools like Stanford, up from 1.4%. The Senate is currently debating a version of the bill which would set the endowment tax at 8%. According to the student newspaper the Stanford Daily, a 21% endowment tax would cost the university approximately $750m annually.At $37.6bn in August 2024, Stanford has the third-largest endowment of any university in the United States, after only Harvard and Yale. During the 2024-2025 academic year, the university disbursed $1.8bn of that endowment to support financial aid and academic programs. In preparation for coming federal cuts, Levin and Martinez said the university would increase its endowment disbursement by 2.9%.That increased disbursement is intended to support financial aid and doctoral student funding, Levin and Martinez said, as well as continued research. To lessen the impact of budget cuts, the university said it would limit capital and facilities expenditures to the most critical ones or those with external funding.Stanford has faced growing federal scrutiny this year apart from its finances. In March, the justice department announced it would investigate whether Stanford, alongside three other California universities, was complying with the supreme court’s ban on affirmative action. More