Parents File Lawsuit Against Kentucky School That Expelled Daughter Over Rainbow Cake

The parents of a Kentucky teen who was expelled for celebrating her birthday with a rainbow cake have filed a lawsuit against the school.

Courthouse News reports: The parents of Kentucky high school student Kayla Kenney sued Louisville’s Whitefield Academy in Jefferson County Circuit Court Thursday for breach of contract, emotional distress and defamation. … The lawsuit claims that the school’s expulsion of Kayla skipped several steps in its disciplinary process, and that school officials’ subsequent release of details about Kayla’s disciplinary record violated its privacy policies. … Also named in the complaint are the American Conservative magazine and its senior editor Rod Dreher, who published a post Jan. 17 entitled “Rainbow Cake Girl: The True Story” with photos taken from the 15-year-old’s private Instagram account.

More from WDRB.com: “They made an assumption about a child’s sexual identity based on a birthday cake and a sweatshirt,” said attorney Georgia Connally, who filed the suit in Jefferson County Circuit Court. The suit identifies Kayla as an LGBTQ child, but Connally said she was not openly gay before she was expelled. “The school went to the media to defend themselves,” Connally said. “They have a privacy policy, a confidentiality policy, that’s also in the contract, and they didn’t follow it. And that put a child in harm’s way.”

Read the full complaint here.