Two teenage boys who objected to sharing a locker room with a biological female were hit with suspensions after being found responsible for sexual harassment and sex-based discrimination by Virginia’s Loudoun County Public Schools.
The district notified the boys’ parents of the punishment on Friday, following an investigation by the district’s Title IX coordinator into the March incident at Stone Bridge High School in Ashburn.
One of the parents, Renae Smith, said she was “absolutely floored that they came back and branded my son responsible for sexual harassment and sex-based discrimination with no solid evidence whatsoever.”
Ms. Smith added in her comments to the District’s WJLA-TV, “We’re talking about scarring him for life by a biased process that’s supposed to protect fairness, but it’s shocking,” It’s wrong, and it should terrify every single parent.”
Seth Wolfe, the father of the other boy, said his son “has become the latest casualty of Loudoun County’s woke, indoctrination policies.”
He added in the statement issued Tuesday by the Founding Freedoms Law Center, which represents the families, “Every parent should be alarmed — because if it can happen to our child, it can happen to yours.”
The boys, who were then sophomores, came under investigation after the female-to-male transgender student entered the locker room in March and secretly recorded them making comments like, “Why is there a girl in the locker room?”
One of the boys had also told the physical education teacher and principal that he was uncomfortable sharing the locker room with a girl.
While both boys were found responsible, one of them will avoid the school-based punishment because he no longer attends Stone Bridge.
Ms. Smith said her family has since moved out of the state, but that her son would have to complete the suspension if he returns. The disciplinary action will also be reflected on his permanent record.
“Every parent should be terrified,” says a former Loudon County, VA, mom after discovering that her son faced a 10-day school suspension for “sex-based discrimination” after he expressed discomfort about changing in a locker room with a girl pretending to be boy. She said her son… pic.twitter.com/cRMZ0Ng38E
— Moms for Liberty (@Moms4Liberty) August 19, 2025
Mr. Wolfe’s son will be suspended for the first two weeks of the 2025-26 academic year, which begins on Thursday, and will be required to execute a no-contact order with the student who filed the complaint.
The boy must also develop a “correction plan” with school administrators, which raised red flags with his legal counsel.
“FFLC attorneys are actively preparing next steps to defend these boys and ensure the district correction ’plan’ is not used as a vehicle for government indoctrination,” the center said in a statement.
Virginia Attorney General Jason Miyares, a Republican, called the suspensions “completely unjustified.”
“Loudoun County Public Schools weaponized Title IX to punish male students for expressing discomfort at being forced to share a locker room with a female student,” Mr. Miyares said in a statement Tuesday. “This suspension is completely unjustified and tramples their constitutional rights. My Office is monitoring the situation.”
In June, Mr. Miyares referred the incident to the U.S. Department of Justice and Department of Education after his investigation revealed a “disturbing misuse of authority by Loudoun County Public Schools.”
The district initially launched sex-discrimination investigations into three boys, but dropped the charges against one of them in June while adding sex-discrimination charges to the probes into the remaining two boys.
The center, which represented all three students, said the boy whose case was dismissed was Muslim, while the other two boys are Christian, spurring concerns about religious discrimination.
“Now, to be clear, we are thrilled for our Muslim client. LCPS did the right thing in dropping his charge. He did nothing wrong,” the center said in a June 12 statement. “But LCPS shows their blatant religious discrimination by completely letting him off while adding more charges to the Christian boys who are alleged to have done exactly the same thing.”
The district’s Policy 8040 lets students use restrooms and locker rooms based on gender identity.
Josh Hetzler, an attorney for the boys, urged the Justice Department to “bring action to correct this wrong.”
Loudoun County was one of four Northern Virginia school districts that refused last week to sign a proposed resolution agreement with the federal government after an investigation found that their gender-identity policies violate Title IX, which bans sex discrimination in education.
LCPS spokesman Dan Adams declined to comment on the investigation’s outcome, citing student privacy.
“It is the general practice of LCPS not to publicly discuss private student matters,” Mr. Adams said in an email. “I can state that the division has a comprehensive and objective process for Title IX investigations.”
Mr. Adams later added: “At no time would LCPS suspend a student simply because they express discomfort. A reading of our Title IX resources should make it clear that there is a high bar to launch a Title IX investigation and an even higher bar to determine a student is in violation of Title IX.”
The Education Department said Friday it will begin the process of suspending or withdrawing federal funding from the five school districts, a move that involves hundreds of millions of dollars in education funding.
The districts had asked the department to wait for the outcome of a Supreme Court case scheduled to be heard in the 2025-26 term that involves whether Title IX includes gender identity.
