EXCLUSIVE – Lawyers are demanding answers about an alleged attempt by a Texas high school to repeatedly use a masculine name and male pronouns for a biological teenage girl, despite parental objections.
Lawyers wrote to Texas’ largest school district after parents suspected their daughter was secretly socially transitioning at school.
Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), a conservative legal advocacy group, sent a demand letter to Bellaire High School (BHS), which is part of the Houston Independent School District (HISD), on behalf of the student’s parents, requesting records from the school in accordance with Texas’ open records law.
The ADF letter claims that in the fall of 2023, BHS employees began referring to the female student by a masculine name and male pronouns without her parents’ knowledge or consent.
In December 2023, the parents discovered a masculine name on their daughter’s schoolwork and immediately informed her teachers to stop using that name.
In response, their daughters’ teachers informed them that she would only be referred to by her legal name and female pronouns.
However, despite teachers’ initial assurances, they discovered a few months later that school employees were once again using masculine names and pronouns, according to the letter.
The parents asked the high school employees to stop again, and they said they would, but they allegedly didn’t.
According to the letter, the student’s parents met with Bellaire’s principal, Michael Niggli, in September 2024 and requested confirmation that school employees refer to their daughter only by her given name and female pronouns.
However, according to the ADF, Niggli advised them to consider a “middle ground” solution for what her name would be at school.
The parents then followed up in writing, emailing Principal Niggli to make it clear that HISD employees should only use their daughter’s given name and female pronouns.
He responded that “there will be no emails with directives to call [your daughter] by any particular name,” according to the letter.
Principal Niggli also reportedly told the parents that a school counselor had communicated their instructions to teachers, but ADF claims that because teachers have previously ignored similar instructions from them, they are not confident that this is still the case.
ADF has asked HISD to reassure the student’s parents that its employees are following their instructions regarding their daughter.
They are also requesting documents pertaining to HISD employees’ gender-identity-related use of preferred or chosen names or pronouns for students, such as policy, practice, or guidance documents, training presentations, and related documents. The letter’s deadline, set by ADF, is Friday, March 21.
Vincent Wagner, senior counsel at Alliance Defending Freedom’s Center for Parental Rights, told Fox News Digital that if answers and details are not provided, legal action may be taken.
“If that’s not what happens, then we have to consider what else is on the table and that could be litigation,” he told reporters. “It’s still up in the air what the next steps would be and that will depend on the specifics of HISD’s response.”
The story gained traction after a representative from the parental action group Moms for Liberty spoke at an HISD school board meeting last month on behalf of the girl’s mother, who wishes to remain anonymous.
“On the first day of ninth grade, my daughter’s theater teacher sent home an information sheet for us to fill out,” the Moms for Liberty representative stated last month on behalf of the mother.
“The second line of the sheet inquired about her pronouns. Multiple teachers began addressing her by a different name and pronoun. One teacher even went so far as to cross out my daughter’s legal name from her paper and write her preferred name in red ink.
“This happened without our knowledge, and certainly without our consent. This contradicts our Christian faith, the advice of her therapist, and, frankly, common sense.
We met with her teachers, counselors, and principal, but to no avail. “HISD is purposefully and secretively transitioning minors,” she stated before her time was up and her microphone was cut.
The public statement drew the attention of Texas Governor Greg Abbott, who directed the Texas Education Agency (TEA) to launch an investigation into the allegations.
“No parent should have to go through this. Another reason why parents should have school choice. “No school should be involved in ‘transitioning’ a child,” Abbott wrote on X. “If this is not already illegal, it will be after this session.”
Wagner stated that ADF and the student’s parents are primarily looking for relevant documents that should be available under the Texas Public Information Act, which the parents allegedly filed multiple times.
Fox News Digital reached out to the school district for comment.
“One responsive document showed that teachers were continuing to refer to their daughter by the masculine name even after our clients met with Principal Niggli,” according to the ADF letter. “So to understand exactly what HISD employees had been doing with their daughter, they sent a second public records request on January 3, 2025.”
“In response to that request, HISD initially said it had over 18,000 responsive documents,” according to the letter. “A month later, it replied that it had no responsive documents and closed the request. It never provided a single document in response to that second request, let alone an explanation for the discrepancy.
Wagner said that HISD’s failure to comply with the Texas Public Information Act could result in litigation over the school district’s responsibilities to parents.
“Given the pattern of failure and the existing ambiguity, we ask that HISD promptly assure us and our clients that HISD employees will refer to their daughter only by her given name and female pronouns,” according to the letter.
“Please also send us copies of all correspondence sent that instructs HISD employees on how they may address our client’s daughter.”
Wagner stated that ADF is also seeking clarification on HISD’s policy regarding transgender students, as well as any other guidance in the absence of a board-level policy.
“What practices does HISD follow in these sorts of situations, and also how are teachers trained to handle them?” asked the gentleman.
“When you tell teachers that a student is struggling with gender and has questions, what do you advise teachers to do? What instructions are given to teachers and other employees for dealing with situations like these?”
HISD serves over 189,000 students at 274 campuses and is one of the largest employers in Houston, with about 27,000 employees, according to HISD’s website.
