US: Trans student banned from Christian university for ‘engaging in fraud’ and ‘concealing identity’
A trans student in California has been banned from a Christian university after administrators revoked her application, claiming she was engaged in “fraud” because of her gender identity.
Domaine Javier was initially accepted into the California Baptist University (CBU) in Riverside to study for a nursing degree.
However, when administrators discovered her transgender history, her application was revoked, citing “committing or attempting to engage in fraud, or concealing identity” because she marked her gender as “female.”
CBU also banned Ms Javier from campus grounds for the same reason.
Her trans identity was discovered after an official saw she had appeared on MTV’s ‘True Life’ in 2011, where she talked about transitioning.
As a result, Ms Javier was called in to an unaccompanied meeting with the university dean, where she was told she was “committing fraud,” and that she would be banned from the university.
The law firm Davis Wright Tremaine (DWT) have now offered to file a lawsuit against CBU on behalf of Ms Javier.
Paul Southwick from DWT described the case as “enormously significant.”
He said: “The university breached its contract with Javier, and also violated California’s Unruh Civil Rights Act, which prohibits businesses from discriminating based on gender identity.
“This case stands for the proposition that a religious institution that makes services available to the public and receives public funds can’t discriminate based on religious views.
“When CBU chose to suspend, exclude, and expel Ms Javier because of her gender identity, it violated the Unruh Civil Rights Act and must pay her damages for the injuries it caused her.”
CBU have attempted to dismiss the case, using “religious freedom” as a defence.
Mara Keisling, of the National Center for Transgender Equality, said: “California Baptist University should be ashamed of itself.
“First of all, she didn’t commit fraud. Second, that wasn’t their motivation. Their motivation was that they found out they had a transgender student, so they came up with an insulting, hare-brained excuse to expel her.”
Ms Javier was born in the Philippines, and she moved to California when she was 12.
She was the focus of an MTV True Life documentary in 2011, where she discussed the difficulties she has faced as a transgender person.
Professor Heath Adam Ackley, 47, was the chair of theology at Azusa Pacific University for 15 years. He came out to students as a trans man last year, in a sermon entitled “Come as You Are! God’s Good News for All People!”
