Students walk out to protest abortion

UPDATE: So far there have been no reports of administrators or teachers penalizing students from Rocklin High School in Northern California for participating in Wednesday’s Pro-life Walkout, according to Alexandra Snyder, executive director of the Life Legal Defense Foundation. LLDF sent a letter to Rocklin High School Principal Davis Stewart on Monday stating that accommodating students for a gun violence walkout while penalizing students for the pro-life walkout would constitute a violation of students’ rights according to the First Amendment and Equal Protection Clause of the U.S. Constitution. Snyder said that if LLDF receives any reports of penalties for participating students, the organization will “consider legal options.”

OUR EARLIER REPORT (2:36 p.m.): Students at schools nationwide Wednesday participated in a pro-life walkout to protest legal abortion and the taxpayer funding of Planned Parenthood. The protest, called the Pro-Life Walkout and organized by Students for Life of America, took place at 10 a.m. local time across the country. SFLA said it expected students at more than 400 high schools and colleges to participate by walking out of their classrooms for 17 minutes of silence and prayer to honor the 10 babies who would die at Planned Parenthood abortion centers during that time. The event was initiated by Brandon Gillespie, a student at Rocklin High School near Sacramento, Calif. One of Gillespie’s teachers was placed on a two-day, paid administrative leave in March over a class discussion about whether school administrators would show equal deference to various student walkouts. Pro-Life Walkout student organizers at Rocklin asked their principal and the Rocklin Unified School District for the same accommodations as were given to students for the March 14 National School Walkout to protest gun violence—which included no scheduled tests and the use of the school’s amphitheater and sound system—but on Wednesday morning, the district sent a letter to the students saying they would not make those accommodations, according to Alexandra Snyder, executive director of the California-based Life Legal Defense Foundation. Snyder, who was near the Rocklin High School campus on Wednesday morning to watch the walkout, said the school’s actions constituted illegal “viewpoint discrimination.” Snyder was not allowed on campus but said she did see students gathering outside of the school for 17 minutes.