Texas school district ordered libraries to remove LGBTQ books. Feds open investigation

Officials with the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights have opened an investigation of the Granbury school district over an order to remove “inappropriate” books from its library shelves.

The action by federal officials comes after the American Civil Liberties Union of Texas filed a civil rights complaint in July alleging that Superintendent Jeremy Glenn’s anti-LGBTQIA+ remarks and the Granbury school district’s subsequent book removals constituted unlawful sex discrimination under Title IX and created a hostile environment for LGBTQIA+ students.

The books covered topics that included the LGBT community, racism, abortion and sexuality.

Federal officials confirmed to the ACLU on Dec. 6 that after evaluating the complaint, they were opening an investigation, noting that “Granbury ISD has been informed of your complaint allegation to be investigated, and OCR has requested documentation and information from the District,” according to a Tuesday news release from the ACLU of Texas.

An investigation began because “the district is a recipient of Federal financial assistance, (and) OCR has jurisdiction to process this complaint under Title IX.”

“Public school districts cannot discriminate against students on the basis of sex, gender identity, or sexual orientation.,” said Chloe Kempf, an attorney at ACLU of Texas, in the news release. “By choosing to open this investigation in response to our complaint, the federal government is signaling that remedying discrimination against LGBTQIA+ students is a top priority and that school districts cannot deny students the right to be themselves in school, be it through book bans, discriminatory comments, or other harmful policies.”

Glenn and other Granbury school officials could not be reached Tuesday for comment.

In March, Granbury school officials said in a news release that a library review committee put more than 100 books back on the shelves after members did not find “written or visual material that depicts explicit sexual acts or overtly sexual content.” The committee said it identified one book it would remove and would review 25 more.

In the July complaint, ACLU officials noted that on Jan. 10, Glenn convened a meeting of school district librarians, which was recorded, to discuss the removal of LGBTQ+ books on the shelves in district libraries. At that meeting with Granbury ISD librarians, Glenn said: “First, I want to talk about our community. If you do not know this, you’ve probably been under a rock. But Granbury is in a very, very conservative community.

“And our board is very, very conservative. . . . If it is not what you believe, you better hide it,” the superintendent said, according to the recording. “Because it ain’t changing in Granbury. And here, in this community, we’re going to be conservative.”

This report includes information from the Star-Telegram’s archives.