Anmarie Calgaro, a Minnesota mother who filed a lawsuit to prevent her transgender daughter from transitioning, had her case dismissed by a federal judge.
Calgaro filed a federal lawsuit back in November against her 17-year-old daughter along with her school district, two nonprofit health providers, Saint Louis County and local officials. She had claimed her due process rights were being violated because she was not permitted to intervene in her daughter’s transition.
Senior U.S. District Judge Paul A. Magnuson dismissed the suit on Tuesday after finding Calgaro’s claims were “meritless” and that her daughter’s doctors, social service providers, or school officials did not violate her constitutionally protected rights. Calgaro was seeking a summary judgment before July, when her daughter would turn 18, at which time she would become legally emancipated. She claimed her daughter received hormone therapy without her consent and that both the clinic and her school district refused to share her records.
Magnuson’s ruled that the organizations in question did not determine her daughter to be emancipated, and therefore Calgaro’s rights as a parent were not violated. Magnuson also ruled that Calgaro did not allege a specific policy execution by the School Board or County that deprived her of her parental rights.
According to her lawyer, Erick Kaardal, Calgaro is considering an appeal claiming the matter of emancipation rights in Minnesota has not been defined by the ruling. Because her daughter turns 18 in July, any actionable part of the case would be irrelevant. The daughter had been living away from her mother since the age of 15, and Calgaro previously made it known that she did not wish to have any contact with her. At no time did she make an attempt to encourage her daughter to return home, nor did she ever report her as a runaway or pursue any legal action to have her return.
