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A school district is calling for a Utah state board of education member to resign after her social media post implied that a basketball player was transgender, leading to such intense harassment that the district sought police protection for the child.

Granite School District, where the girl attends school, demanded the resignation of state board member Natalie Cline (R) last week. Cline’s fellow board members<b> </b>also lodged <a href="https://schools.utah.gov/publicrelations/_publicrelations_/_2024_/Board%20Leadership%20Statement%20on%20Board%20Member%20Social%20Media.pdf" target=_blank>criticism</a>, as did fellow Republicans in the state’s highest office.

Utah Gov. Spencer Cox (R) and Lt. Gov. Deidre Henderson (R) <a href="https://governor.utah.gov/2024/02/07/gov-spencer-cox-lt-gov-deidre-henderson-denounce-behavior-of-utah-school-board-member-natalie-cline/" target=_blank>said in a joint statement last week</a> that they were “stunned” by Cline’s “unconscionable behavior” toward a student.

“Sadly, this is not the first time that board member Cline has embarrassed the state of Utah and State Board of Education,” Cox and Henderson said, urging the state board to hold Cline accountable.

Cline did not immediately respond to a request for comment Sunday but said in a <a href="https://www.facebook.com/natalie.cline.22/posts/2402666736592415" target=_blank>Facebook post last week</a> that her original, since-deleted post “never claimed the student was a boy.”

Cline apologized for her deleted post while blaming “the push to normalize transgenderism in our society” for her suspicion.

Cline’s insinuation that the teen girl, who is cisgender, was a boy playing girls’ basketball is especially pointed in Utah, where conservative figures have made anti-trans policies a highlight of the legislative agenda in recent years.

Since 2022, Utah has been among the states to propose or codify laws that restrict transgender girls from participating in K-12 athletics. Last year, state lawmakers <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2023/02/01/utah-gender-affirming-care-ban/" target="_blank">banned</a> gender-affirming care for trans minors, and last month Utah became the 11th state to ban trans people from using bathrooms that align with their gender identity in public schools and government buildings, the Associated Press reported.

Al and Rachel van der Beek, the girl’s parents, said Cline owes their family an apology beyond what she expressed on Facebook.

In her<b> </b>Feb. 7 social media post, Cline shared a flier for a girl’s high school basketball game that featured an image of the van der Beeks’ daughter and wrote in the caption, “‘girls’ basketball …”

The van der Beeks, who did not immediately respond to a request for comment Sunday, <a href="https://ksltv.com/620977/parents-of-female-student-athlete-at-the-center-of-controversial-school-board-member-post-speak-out/" target=_blank>told</a> NBC’s Salt Lake City affiliate KSL TV that officials at their daughter’s school alerted them the next morning about Cline’s post and the torrent of threats that followed.

“It was cyberbullying at its finest,” Al van der Beek told the station, calling the comments about his daughter “disgusting.” The van der Beeks described their daughter as a “tomboy” who wears her hair short, wears baggier clothes and regularly hits the gym.

“To look at someone’s outer appearance and make an assumption that they’re either playing in the right arena or not, based on how someone looks, I don’t think is appropriate,” Rachel van der Beek told the station.

The van der Beeks said their daughter, whose name and school were not identified to protect her privacy, does not have social media on her phone. They broke the news to her after school the next day.

Al van der Beek told the TV station that his daughter was lucky to have support from her family and community, because the mental health implications from such cyberbullying could have been catastrophic.

LGBTQ+ youths who face physical threats because of their gender identity or sexual orientation reported triple the rate of suicide attempts compared with those who were not threatened, <a href="https://www.thetrevorproject.org/survey-2023/#intro" target=_blank>according to</a> the 2023 U.S. National Survey on the Mental Health of LGBTQ Young People conducted by the Trevor Project, an LGBTQ suicide prevention nonprofit.

Cline was elected in 2020 to represent parts of Salt Lake City and a northern portion of Utah County after campaigning on religious liberty and culture war issues such as anti-LGBTQ+ policies.

In a little more than three years she has repeatedly drawn controversy — and rebuke — for her comments. In 2021, she called LGBTQ+ students “gender-confused” and said the Black Lives Matter movement was “indoctrination.” Later that year she publicly identified a teacher who she claimed without evidence was teaching students that “communism is better than our form of government” — and encouraged her followers to take action against the teacher. Last year, Cline said schools are “complicit in the grooming of children for sex trafficking” and teach “gender-bending ideologies.”

A 2021 post against LGBTQ+ high school students drew a letter of reprimand from the state board of education, which the Salt Lake Tribune <a href="https://www.sltrib.com/news/education/2021/09/03/utah-school-board/" target=_blank>reports</a> is the first time it had taken disciplinary action against one of its own members.

Equality Utah, a LGBTQ advocacy organization, called Cline’s post about the basketball player “a new level of depravity and bullying.”

“Cline’s post perpetuates the modern-day witch hunt, where hysterical adults police the bodies of children to determine if they are masculine or feminine enough,” Equality Utah said in a statement.

The pressure on Cline to resign is due in part because the state board of education said it lacks the authority to remove her from her elected role. The Utah House of Representatives on Friday unanimously voted to draft a resolution condemning Cline<a href="https://www.sltrib.com/news/politics/2024/02/09/natalie-cline-utah-house-takes/" target=_blank>, the Salt Lake Tribune reports</a>. House members did not specify whether they would try to impeach her in the waning days of the legislative session.

Cline’s four-year term expires in January. According to Utah State Board of Election filings, she plans to run for reelection this fall.

Valparaiso University, BA

Kim Bellware covers national and breaking news for The Washington Post. 

Kim Bellware

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