Defending Ed Files Complaint Against the State of Minnesota for Violations of PPRA

On July 27, 2026, Defending Ed filed a privacy complaint against the state of Minnesota for violations of the Protection of Pupil Rights Amendment (PPRA), as well as the First and Fourteenth Amendments.

As reported by Fox News and the New York Post, Minnesota’s new statewide “MyGender Dolls” program will provide students aged 4-10 with transgender dolls containing “removable internal and external genitals,” that feature “more than 100 interchangeable pieces of clothing, accessories and hairstyles—like a trans Mr./Mrs. Potato Head.” According to the My Gender Dolls website, the dolls will be available to school counselors, educators, mental health providers, pediatricians, and others.

Minnesota parents in Defending Education’s network have not been informed about MyGender Dolls’ forthcoming launch in their children’s schools, nor is DE aware of any such communications being sent to any Minnesota parents or school board members. As the New York Post notes, “[i]t is not known if parents” whose children attend schools that use the dolls “will be able to opt out of” the program.

Under the PPRA, federally funded educational institutions are prohibited from requiring students “to submit to a survey, analysis, or evaluation” that elicits “information concerning” the student’s “sex, behavior. or attitudes” or any “mental or psychological problems” the student might have. Schools are also required to work with parents “to protect student privacy” in the event any such activity is undertaken, and schools must respect a parent’s “right” to “inspect” any information elicited from such an activity. Additionally, schools must notify parents before any such activity is undertaken and must inform parents of their right to opt their children out of the activity.

As recently affirmed by the Supreme Court in both Mirabelli v. Bonta and Mahmoud v. Taylor, the First and Fourteenth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution protect “parents’ rights to direct the upbringing and education of their children,” especially on matters implicating sex, mental health, and religion. And those rights “follow … children into the public school classroom.” When schools use materials that “present as a settled matter a hotly contested view of sex and gender that sharply conflicts with the” views “that the parents wish to instill in their children,” they burden those constitutionally protected parental rights. The danger is especially great when controversial materials are “presented to young children by authority figures in elementary school classrooms,” and especially when schools “withhold notice to parents [or] forbid opt outs.”

This program also appears to run afoul of White House guidance on this issue of gender identity, including at least three executive orders (14168, 14187, and 14190).

For these reasons, we ask the Student Privacy Policy Office at the U.S. Department of Education and the Department of Justice to swiftly investigate the state of Minnesota for these apparent violations of federal law.

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