New initiative campaigns on parental rights, trans athletes announced
Let’s Go Washington is back with a pair of new proposed initiatives.
On Sept. 8, the conservative political group announced that it will start gathering signatures this month on two initiatives to the Legislature. Both concern issues being fought in today’s culture wars: the rights of parents to access their kids’ school information and records, and whether transgender athletes can participate in girls’ sports.
The first initiative would “undo” House Bill 1296, unraveling changes that lawmakers made last session to Initiative 2081, known as the Parental Bill of Rights.
In 2024, a Let’s Go Washington initiative enshrining parents’ rights to access school records was passed by the state Legislature. This past session, though, Democratic lawmakers pushed to pass HB 1296, which they said was needed to clarify and align the initiative with federal and state law.
But Let’s Go Washington founder Brian Heywood said in a statement that the Legislature effectively “gutted” the original measure. “We don’t co-parent with the government,” Heywood said. “No government employee can care about or love your child like you do.”
HB 1296’s primary sponsor, state Rep. Monica Stonier, said that Let’s Go Washington’s push to restore the original initiative didn’t come as a surprise.
“I think they have been wanting to keep this conversation alive politically with their version of the story, which is one that kind of sows doubt and distrust in our public school system,” she said in a Sept. 8 call. But, she added, “I am a little surprised that they still think this is a winning argument.”
Stonier, a Vancouver Democrat who works as an instructional coach in Evergreen Public Schools, said Heywood and his group also have promoted inaccuracies about what happens in schools to stoke fear among parents.
The other new initiative centers on “protecting fairness in girls’ sports” by preventing transgender athletes from competing in female sports.
Heywood also bankrolled initiatives last year that would have rolled back Washington’s long-term care program and repealed the state’s capital gains tax and statewide carbon emissions cap. Another voter-approved initiative seeking to safeguard natural gas availability is currently tangled up in the courts.
A coalition of teachers, parents, businesses, community and LGBTQ groups called “Washington Families for Freedom” is condemning the latest batch of proposed initiatives as an attack on students’ right to privacy and dignity.
Aaron Ostrom, executive director of the progressive organization Fuse Washington, referred to Heywood as “a desperate mega-millionaire hedge fund manager from California” who’s “intent on throwing away more of his money.”
“Make no mistake, Washingtonians will see through Heywood’s antics and vote down these initiatives, just as they did last time,” Ostrom said in a Sept. 8 news release.
Heywood’s organization will need to gather 308,911 signatures on its initiatives by early January to get them before legislators, according to the Washington State Standard.
This story was originally published September 9, 2025 at 5:00 AM.
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