A woman from Minnesota sued her daughter, a 17-year-old transgender, along with county officials, allegedly for allowing the sex-change procedure to push through without her consent.
Anmarie Calgaro filed the federal lawsuit against Saint Louis County, two nonprofit health care providers, the county school district, local officials and the teenager. She argues that the completed gender change were in violation of her rights to due process.
In a tearful news conference, Calgaro said, “Not only was I robbed of the opportunity to help my son make good decisions, but I also feel he was robbed of a key advocate in his life, his mother.” She emphasized that she is not against the act of gender reassignment, but just wants her child to “slow down” in decision-making, the New York Daily News reports.
Linnea Mirsch, the St. Louis County Public Health and Human Services Department director, who was also named as a defendant in the suit, declined to comment. She said,
Both federal and state laws strictly limit what information may be shared regarding individuals who may or may not be receiving services from Saint Louis County.
The parent-child feud started when Calgaro received a letter from the Mid-Minnesota Legal Aid saying that there had been a “substantial severing of the parent-child relationship.” The letter added, “Conduct by the parent in giving up control and custody of the minor will legally emancipate the child under Minnesota law.”
Now a high school junior, the teenager was born a boy. Prior to the procedure, he had lived away from his mother for six months, and had taken two jobs to support himself, the same letter stated. Calgaro never reported him missing, or as a runaway; neither did she attempt to bring him back home, though she knew where he was living. The letter also said, she “has made it known to him that she no longer wishes to have any contact with him.”
The findings documented in the letter prompted a motion in which the county funded the teen’s sex change and medications, as a minor covered by social services, the lawsuit reported. The teen’s health and academic records were also sealed from Calgaro.
Along with the letter was an emancipation notice filed by the teen in Stearns County District Court in October 2015.
Under Minnesota law, minors are allowed access to medical care and procedures even without their parents’ consent, NBC News reports. The state has no legal processes in place for the emancipation of minors, but considers minors who don’t live with their parents as adults. It states, “Any minor who is living separate and apart from parents … and who is managing personal financial affairs, regardless of the source or extent of the minor’s income, may give effective consent to personal medical, dental, mental and other health services, and the consent of no other person is required.”
Calgaro denies the claims about her relationship with her child. She further accuses that county officials, school administrators and medical providers all went ahead without her parental consent on the sex-change. State law gave her no options but to challenge the violation of her parental rights, the suit said. Erick Kaardal and lawyers from the Thomas More Society, an anti-abortion firm, are representing Calgaro.
