East Providence residents once again repel anti-trans Christian nationalist

"As a parent, I want to ensure that all students can participate in sports in any way that makes them comfortable because diversity is our strength in East Providence."

As usual, when the Westerly-based anti-trans Christian Nationalist delivers his ugly and bigoted screeds at school committee meetings across the state, all he accomplishes is giving people who love and support our students an opportunity to speak out and defend them. You can read his latest performance at the footnote,¹ and the full video of last night’s meeting is available here.

There was nothing on last night’s East Providence School Committee agenda related to the district’s transgender, gender diverse, and transitioning student policy or Title IX. (Title IX is civil rights legislation passed in the 70s that prohibits sex discrimination in schools that receive federal funding and covers every public school in the country, more or less.) Why Chiaradio showed up unannounced is anyone’s guess. But three East Providence residents took to the podium to oppose bigotry and support our students.

Here they are:

Libby Merrill: I am the parent of an elementary school student in the East Providence School District. I want to start by saying I’m so glad I came to tonight’s meeting because there was so much good news. Every time I hear employees of this district come up, present, and speak, I’m happy and proud to be a parent here. Well done to all of the employees.

I also want to start by saying that in East Providence, I saw that the MLL (multilingual learners) presentation said, “Diversity is our strength.” That is absolutely true. Diversity means all kinds of diversity—diversity of language, group, race, and gender identity. All of that is the strength our students bring when they come in every day.

Title IX does not say anything about bathrooms or sports. Title IX prohibits discrimination based on sex. It is correct that the language has changed in the last couple of years, but the East Providence policy was behind, and it never got updated. So our policy already doesn’t have gender identity in it, which is unfortunate because I think that it should protect gender identity, too. But it’s also irrelevant - because in the State of Rhode Island, we have to as a city adhere not just to federal law but also state law, and the State of Rhode Island’s guidance already protects gender identity. There are non-discrimination laws that protect against discrimination based on gender identity. We already have to stick to those.

The last speaker and I don’t agree on many things, but one thing we do agree on is that I also don’t think that the Rhode Island Interscholastic League should have removed their strong language saying that students can participate in sports based on their gender identity because I don’t think it’s fair to have kicked that back to principals. I have written to the Rhode Island Interscholastic League to say the same thing because people need to be protected in sports.

If you follow the logic of banning transgender girls from girls’ sports, even a little bit, you’ll see that it actually would hurt all girls. It is not about protecting girls. I don’t want my daughter, who just called me because I’m missing bedtime, to have to prove her sex to play in a girls’ sport. That’s pretty horrifying to me - to think that my daughter would have to take a hormone test or a physical exam at some point to prove her sex to participate in a girls’ sport. That’s the logical outcome of putting parameters around gender in sports. That’s what we see. In Boston, recently, a person was kicked out of a bathroom because someone assumed a cis woman was a trans woman. After all, gender is a social construct that’s been made up, and there’s not a clear way to determine that.

As we know, discriminating against one group often has the impact of discriminating against multiple groups. I don’t want that to happen here. As a parent, I want to ensure that all students can participate in sports in any way that makes them comfortable because diversity is our strength in East Providence.

Melodie Pimentel: As a resident of East Providence in Ward 3 and a proud East Providence High School graduate of the Class of 2015, I urge the school committee to stand firm in protecting transgender students. I strongly oppose altering existing policies in response to recent executive orders or directives. The school department must not act to align with these new federal policies. While one federal court has questioned the Biden Administration’s Title IX interpretation, this does not override RIDE (Rhode Island Department of Education)’s guidance. Other courts may rule that the current administration’s orders are arbitrary and capricious under the Administrative Procedures Act.

Even if upheld, these directives do not permit our state to trample on student civil rights beyond Title IX. Federal law offers explicit protections. The 2022 Fourth Circuit ruling in Williams v Kincaid confirmed that Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act safeguards students with gender dysphoria. This applies directly to public school districts like ours, requiring reasonable accommodations, such as restroom access matching a student’s gender identity, to be evaluated on a case-by-case basis.

These are not optional. They are legal obligations to help uphold every student’s rights. For guidance, I urge the committee to refer to the joint letter from the Office of the Attorney General and the Rhode Island Department of Education dated February 28th, 2025. It is titled, “Ensuring a Safe and Inclusive Learning Environment for All Students.” This guidance reinforces our duty to protect them.

Finally, I ask the committee to keep its focus on the district’s real challenges—reducing absenteeism. We’re seeing progress there, and we must build on that, boosting our low test scores and supporting our students in poverty. These issues shape our students’ futures and deserve our attention. We should not focus on the cultural distractions that the gentleman from Westerly brought up tonight. I thank you for your time and dedication to our students in our community.

Jimmy Dufurrena: I’m from Ward Three. I would like to respectfully urge the school committee to stand firm in protecting all students within our District, including our transgender students. Contrary to the suggestion from the gentleman from Westerly, I believe our focus should remain on the critical issues facing our city, such as the impact of poverty on test scores and educational outcomes, as well as ensuring students are equipped to graduate with real-world skills to find meaningful employment. I understand this is a sensitive issue. I grew up down south and was a registered Republican most of my life. But as my affiliations have changed, my principles have not. I firmly believe the government has no right to tell our students what their gender expression should be.

1. Robert Chiaradio: I addressed this committee before. Do you remember Mr. Ferreira?

[The last time Chiaradio spoke before this committee, School Committeemember Anthony Ferreira left his seat. He did the same thing again, walking past Chiaradio.]

Robert Chiaradio: Good. Do what you’ve got to do. I’ll reclaim my time.

Anthony Ferreira: [Inaudible]

Robert Chiaradio: Classy. A lot of class you got...

Chair David Luiz: Hey, listen. If you want to make… You have three minutes... Go ahead.

Robert Chiaradio: A federal judge invalidated the Biden Administration’s attempted illegal Title IX hijacking on January 9th. Then, President Trump signed two executive orders restoring Title IX to its original intent, which was to protect citizens, especially girls, against discrimination based on sex, not gender identity. That is covered under Title VI and Title VII. These executive orders keep biological males out of female sports and private spaces, eliminate the mandated use of pronouns by teachers and staff, and make it known to all that there will be no secrets kept from parents regarding any social transitioning of their children while at school.

Our Attorney General and RIDE commissioner think it’s fine and fair for boys to compete with girls athletically and to occupy the same bathrooms and locker rooms as them, violating their private spaces simply because they identify as girls. They don’t care about the law in this case, or the truth, because they have an agenda. One cannot pick and choose which laws one obeys. The Rhode Island Interscholastic League has attempted to cover itself by kicking the can back to the local districts, like you. They all know that this is wrong; that’s why they did it, and it’s unlawful, and they’re more than willing to let you take the fall, which you will.

Instead of heeding the advice from the Attorney General and Angélica Infante-Green, you need to do two things: You need to immediately change your Title IX policy, as several districts around the state have already done to have President Trump’s 2020 ruling, which protects all people against discrimination based on sex, not gender identity in Title IX - exactly the way Title IX was intended when it was written and adopted by Congress in 1972. Your current policy on your website conflicts with the federal judge’s January 9th ruling, which is unlawful.

Secondly, you need to protect our girls. The State of Maine, Columbia University, and others have found out that this administration is serious and needs to dump RIDE trans guidance, violating federal law, and toss the Attorney General’s letter in the trash. If you don’t, you’ll lose funding, place this district in legal peril, and be subject to Title IX and Office of Civil Rights complaints.

Wrapping up, you cannot continue to place our girls, with this policy, in unsafe, uncomfortable, and unlawful positions. This is simple common sense, right versus wrong, and it is the law. If your solicitor is worth his or her salt, you’ll be advised to make this change. The state’s and district’s obsession with gender identity and discriminating against biological girls will end one way or the other. It is your choice.