California schools join growing list of districts across the country banning Pride flags

As another academic year gets underway, more school boards across the country are debating banning LGBTQ Pride flags, with civil rights advocates arguing the flags are constitutionally protected expression.

This week, two California school boards voted to ban certain flags, including the LGBTQ Pride flag, amid concerns from parents who supported and opposed the bans.

In recent years, school districts across the country have presented flag restrictions as a means to avoid favoring any one group over another. Some measures limit flag displays to government and military flags – effectively banning the Pride flag, LGBTQ advocates say.

"It has become clear with a little analysis that their real focus is to ban the rainbow flag," said Jay Blotcher, co-founder of New York City's Gilbert Baker Foundation, an LGBTQ advocacy group named for the Pride flag's creator. "They're willing to put a ban on other flags in their zeal to ban the rainbow flag," Blotcher told USA TODAY.

For months, LGBTQ groups have warned banning gay Pride symbols in schools are an extension of curriculum bans restricting mentions of LGBTQ topics. In many states, LGBTQ curriculum bans were passed alongside bans on critical race theory, making the restrictions part of a larger push against inclusion and diversity, advocates say.

"What unites the efforts to further marginalize trans youth, ban books and ban Pride flags is a desire to make the world less safe for queer youth," said Gillian Branstetter, a spokesperson for the American Civil Liberties Union LGBTQ and HIV Project. "The message that flags send is that anywhere it is flown you will be safe and respected and loved for who you are."

The American Civil Liberties Union teamed up with the Gilbert Baker Foundation this year to create legal resources for communities across the country to fight back against proposals to ban the Pride flag.

Who is banning Pride flags?

In recent years, the Gilbert Baker Foundation has tracked dozens of instances of municipal governments across the country banning certain flags on government property, and school boards passing restrictions banning Pride flags in schools.

Most recently, municipalities in California and across the country voted in May and June against flying Pride flags, around the time flags would have been displayed in government buildings for Pride Month, Blotcher said.

California school boards ban Pride flags

This week, two California school boards passed flag bans after voting along ideological lines, local outlets reported.

In California's Alameda County, the Sunol school board voted 2-1 Tuesday to ban Pride flags at the town's only elementary school, the Mercury News reported. Sunol is part of northern California's Bay Area and has a population of under 1,000.

Also on Tuesday, the Temecula school board in southern California voted 3-2 to ban all flags except the U.S. flag and the state flag, with limited exceptions, the Press-Enterprise in Riverside reported.

In both cases, parents are considering recall attempts against conservative board members who voted in favor of the flag bans, the outlets reported.

Young LGBTQ people need all the affirmation they can get, including at school, Blotcher said, adding that rates of suicide for queer youth are higher than for other groups.

"Being LGBTQ in this country right now is getting tougher. Now kids are under fire," Blotcher said. "You're seeing a trend of LGBTQ kids who are being suppressed resorting to self harm, and banning the flag is another step towards harming these kids and putting them at risk," he said.

Are Pride flags constitutionally protected?

Municipal policies banning only the Pride flag are considered "viewpoint discrimination" under the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, according to the ACLU.

In schools, the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled First Amendment protections extend to "teachers and students," neither of whom "shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gate," the ACLU says in its Pride flag legal resource.

But until a lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of Pride flag bans reaches the Supreme Court, municipalities and school boards can keep passing blanket flag bans, Blotcher said.

Contributing: Marc Ramirez