An LGBTQ student and a child of LGBTQ parents, with their parents and the ACLU of Minnesota, have filed a lawsuit against a Minnesota school district that banned rainbow “safe space” stickers as well as rainbow posters, flags, and buttons.
The Ban
For over two years, some teachers at the public high school in Detroit Lakes, Minnesota, had posted 2-by-3-inch rainbow flag stickers in their classroom windows as “a quiet signal that all students are welcome, regardless of their sexual orientation or gender identity,” says the lawsuit filed in partnership with the ACLU of Minnesota and pro bono partner Lockridge Grindal Nauen PLLP.
On July 27, 2026, however, the Detroit Lakes School Board voted 4 to 2 in favor of “the immediate removal of all non-school materials not funded, sponsored, or authorized by the school district,” including “any rainbow stickers, posters, flags, buttons, etc. displayed in Detroit Lakes Public Schools facilities.”
The stickers were a “core concern” of those favoring the ban, the suit says. Before the vote, however, the high school principal “confirmed that, despite being present for years, the rainbow stickers had never been an issue at the high school.”
The ban was introduced orally by a board member, violating the board’s own requirement that 24 hours’ notice must be given to all board members and the superintendent before adding an item to the agenda, per the complaint. The superintendent also “raised concerns about violations of Minnesota’s Open Meeting Law because the two board members who voted against the Ban had no idea that the Ban was being discussed,” and “members of the public, including parents of affected students, were unaware that it would be discussed.” Despite that, the ban passed.
The Students
L.S., an LGBTQ 11th grader, brought the claim against the school through their mother, Amber Estenson. (Minors cannot themselves sue.) L.S. has been part of the school’s Gay Straight Alliance club, now known as Detroit Lakes Queer Community (DLQC), since 9th grade, and is currently its president. Estenson “wishes for L.S. to have access to a public education free from discrimination, where L.S. can express their identity without fear of reprisal from the District,” the lawsuit says. It adds that L.S. themself worries about what will happen if teachers cannot express support for LGBTQ students, who may no longer feel safe or know where to go for support. At a previous school they attended, L.S. “believes that anti-LGBTQ+ bullying of a student led to that student passing away due to suicide.”
Even before the ban, posters for the DLQC movie night had been ripped off of school walls, the lawsuit notes; now, “The Ban not only condones that targeted removal—it mandates it.” L.S. also reported teachers’ rainbow stickers being ripped down or vandalized since the ban.
C.H., an elementary school student in the district, brought the claim through their mother, Nicole Hadding. Hadding, who is LGBTQ herself, intends for C.H. to be part of the district through high school and “wishes for C.H. to be free to share about their parents and express their identity as a member of an LGBTQ+ family without fear of reprisal from the District. Since the ban, however, the family has “considered whether to instruct C.H. to limit their own speech and expression regarding their family.”
The Lawsuit
Catherine Ahlin-Halverson, ACLU-MN deputy legal director, said in a press statement, “We filed this lawsuit because the Rainbow Ban casts a pall over the entire Detroit Lakes School District, chilling speech in support of LGBTQ+ students and families, who deserve to be cared for, valued, and protected.” The suit argues that the ban violates students’ constitutional free speech and equal protection rights and was driven by anti-LGBTQ animus rather than any legitimate or compelling government interest.
That animus seems clear. Mickey Okeson, a school board member who helped coordinate and pass the ban, argued for it by noting, “back in 2015 when the same-sex marriage law was passed, at that time it was just lesbian and gay, and now all of a sudden we’re all [] up to T and plus too,” the lawsuit relates.
Board Chair John Steffl, who also supported the ban, told Karen Tolkkinen of the Minneapolis Star Tribune that it would apply to Pride patches on backpacks, as well as flags and materials for things like Blue Lives Matter, Black Lives Matter, and the National Rifle Association. When Tolkkinen asked him about cross necklaces, however, he said that they don’t bother him, because he is a Christian. His willingness to permit crosses but not other symbols “confirms that the LGBTQ+ Pride Ban is not based on neutrality, but rather the personal viewpoints of a simple majority of the Board,” the lawsuit says.
Because only “rainbow” materials were explicitly listed in the ban, and the discussion at the subsequent board meeting, in August, “revolved around its impacts on the LGBTQ+ community,” the ban clearly targets a specific group, the plaintiffs argue. The board in August even rejected a proposal drafted by its legal counsel that “specifically pointed to the language … that referred to “rainbow stickers, posters, flags and buttons” and urged postponing implementation of the ban to “ensure the District remains neutral on matters involving political, social, religious, or other controversial topics in which different perspectives and ideologies are present at the local, state, and national levels.”
At that August meeting, says the lawsuit, some LGBTQ former students told the board “that rainbow stickers in classroom doors told them which teachers they could turn to in some of the most isolating periods of their life. As one former student stated, ‘[i]t meant at least one person would stick up for me.’ The rainbow stickers had the power to save students’ lives.”