He Just Wants to Know If a Boy Uses His Daughter’s Bathroom. The District Won’t Say Either Way — So He’s Suing.
- 2 written requests Brandon Matthews sent Cabarrus County principals in May 2026 — one for his 4th-grade daughter's elementary school, one for his son's high school — asking only whether a biological male may use their facilities, not which student — AFL complaint, filed Aug. 2026, M.D.N.C.
- 2 federal lawsuits America First Legal has filed against Cabarrus County Schools in under two weeks, over facilities policy and a separate biological-male-in-girls'-facilities allegation — Fox News, Aug. 9, 2026; WCNC, July 31, 2026
- $0 in damages Matthews' lawsuit seeks — it asks only for disclosure and an injunction; the separate Cox Mill suit seeks damages 'to be determined at trial' — AFL complaints
- June 1 the date the U.S. Dept. of Education's Office for Civil Rights opened a Title IX investigation into Cabarrus County Schools, one of two North Carolina districts under a parallel probe — WCNC, June 1, 2026
- Pending the status of both lawsuits and the federal civil-rights investigation — no ruling, no finding, no admission from the district as of this writing — Case dockets, M.D.N.C., as of Aug. 9, 2026
Brandon Matthews has two children in the Cabarrus County Schools system, north of Charlotte, North Carolina — a daughter in fourth grade at Mount Pleasant Elementary School, and a son in his senior year at Mount Pleasant High School. In May 2026 he sent both principals a written question. Not a complaint. Not a demand to identify anyone. Just a question: is a biological male permitted to use the bathroom or locker-room facilities his children use.
According to the federal complaint he later filed, he never got a yes or a no. Both principals sent back nearly identical replies. The elementary school principal’s answer, quoted verbatim in the lawsuit, read in full:
“Because matters involving individual students are confidential, the school cannot confirm, disclose, or provide advance notice regarding the status, identity, or accommodations of any particular student.”
Mount Pleasant Elementary School principal, written reply to Brandon Matthews, quoted in the federal complaint, May 2026
Matthews says that non-answer is the injury — not proof that any particular student is using any particular facility, which his complaint does not claim to know. Represented by America First Legal, he sued the Cabarrus County Board of Education, Superintendent Dr. John Kopicki, and both principals in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of North Carolina, and on August 7, 2026 asked the court for a preliminary injunction.
What makes the Matthews complaint unusual among facilities-policy lawsuits is what it deliberately leaves out. It does not allege that a biological male has used his daughter’s bathroom. It does not name, or attempt to identify, any other student. It asks a narrower question: does a parent have a right to know his school district’s actual policy on who may use which facility, in writing, before he needs to act on that information rather than after.
Both principals’ replies leaned on student-confidentiality language to decline answering even that. Matthews’ lawyers argue confidentiality about an individual student’s identity is not the same thing as confidentiality about a district-wide policy — and that the district collapsed the two into one blanket refusal.
Matthews’ suit, filed by America First Legal senior counsel Nicholas Barry and co-counsel Philip Thomas, alleges violations of the First Amendment’s Free Exercise Clause and the Fourteenth Amendment’s Due Process Clause. Notably, it does not bring a Title IX claim — that theory is reserved for a separate suit, discussed below. Barry told Fox News the case turns on a straightforward proposition:
“Brandon Matthews does not currently know whether a male is using his fourth grade daughter's bathroom. And does he have a constitutional right to know that? We say 'yes.'”
Nicholas Barry, America First Legal senior counsel, to Fox News
Barry’s team explicitly ties the case to Mahmoud v. Taylor, the Supreme Court’s 2025 ruling that gave parents a notice-and-opt-out right over certain classroom instruction. He argues the same logic should extend to facilities policy:
“if we continue to push [Mahmoud v. Taylor] forward, and we start getting wins on it, schools around the country are going to have to start disclosing to parents what their policies are and providing parents the opportunity to opt out.”
Nicholas Barry, America First Legal senior counsel, to Fox News
Neither complaint puts a dollar figure on the table for this claim. Matthews is not seeking damages — only a declaration of the district’s obligations and injunctive relief compelling disclosure. If the Mahmoud argument gains traction here, Barry’s team believes it could reshape how school districts nationwide handle facilities-policy disclosure to parents, not just in Cabarrus County.
Matthews’ case is the second America First Legal has filed against the same district in under two weeks. On July 31, 2026, three Cox Mill High School students — identified in the complaint as Mary Doe, Beth Roe, and Diane Poe — sued the Cabarrus County Board of Education and Superintendent Dr. John Kopicki directly, alleging Title IX and Equal Protection violations after a biological male allegedly used girls’ facilities at their school. That suit seeks compensatory damages in an amount to be determined at trial. Unlike Matthews’ complaint, the Cox Mill suit alleges the underlying facilities-use incident occurred — a claim the district has not conceded and no court has yet evaluated.
The two lawsuits are running alongside a third track entirely. On June 1, 2026, the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights opened a Title IX investigation into Cabarrus County Schools’ gender-identity policies — a parallel investigation covers Buncombe County, North Carolina. The district responded publicly that it “remains committed to providing a safe, respectful, and legally compliant learning environment for all students,” without addressing the specific allegations under review.
U.S. Department of Education opens Title IX investigation into Cabarrus County Schools.
Three separate proceedings — two civil suits and one federal civil-rights investigation — are now aimed at the same district over the same underlying category of dispute, and none of them has produced a ruling or a finding.
Matthews has a documented history with this school board that predates the 2026 lawsuits. On October 14, 2024, with his daughter — then 8 years old — standing beside him, he confronted the Cabarrus County Board of Education, calling members “cowards” and saying a boy had followed his daughter into a restroom to watch her. The clip went viral on X. It is worth being precise about what that clip is and isn’t: it is Matthews’ own account of a specific incident, delivered at a public meeting, not a finding by any court or investigator, and it is not part of the 2026 federal complaint, which makes no claim about what has or hasn’t happened in his daughter’s bathroom.
Cabarrus County Schools disputed Matthews’ specific account when a local fact-checking unit, WCNC VERIFY, examined it:
“There was 100% no truth to any previous reporting... [the district is] unaware of any report in which a student has reported being or feeling unsafe in a school bathroom.”
Cabarrus County Schools, statement to WCNC VERIFY, 2024
The clip nonetheless made Matthews a minor conservative-media figure, and the reaction split along familiar lines. Supporters framed his 2024 outburst as parental courage; critics — including the district itself — say the specific claim underlying it was never substantiated.
We don't need more cowards on school boards. ... Thank you Brandon Matthews for being a brave Dad in defense of kids.
Furious father confronts corrupt school board after a boy watched his 8-year-old daughter go to the bathroom. Mr. Matthews told the Cabarrus County school board members to their faces: every single one of them was a coward.
Two years later, Matthews returned to the same district with a much narrower legal claim — not that the 2024 incident happened as he described it, but that the district still won’t say what its policy is, one way or the other.
As of this writing, both federal lawsuits remain pending, with no hearing date set on Matthews’ preliminary-injunction motion and no response yet filed by the district in either case. The Office for Civil Rights investigation opened June 1, 2026 is also unresolved. No court has ruled on the merits of any claim, and no defendant has been found liable for anything.
Dr. John Kopicki, Superintendent, Cabarrus County Schools — an appointed, not elected, position with no party affiliation on record. Named as a defendant in both the Matthews suit and the Cox Mill students’ suit.
Denise Adcock (R), Cabarrus County Board of Education — party affiliation confirmed via the county Republican Party’s own site. Not individually named as a defendant; the Board is sued as a body.
Pam Escobar (D), Cabarrus County Board of Education, at-large — party affiliation confirmed via Ballotpedia. Not individually named as a defendant; the Board is sued as a body.
Several other Cabarrus County Board of Education members’ party affiliations could not be independently confirmed and are omitted here rather than guessed at.
Whatever a court eventually decides about disclosure obligations, the underlying pattern is now three separate federal proceedings — two lawsuits and one civil-rights investigation — all aimed at how one North Carolina district communicates, or declines to communicate, its facilities policy to the parents whose children attend its schools.
Brandon Matthews asked two Cabarrus County principals, in writing, whether a biological male may use his children’s bathroom facilities — without naming any student. Both gave the same confidentiality non-answer, and he sued the Board of Education, Superintendent Dr. John Kopicki, and both principals, seeking disclosure and an injunction rather than damages. It is the second America First Legal suit against the district in two weeks, following three Cox Mill students’ separate Title IX suit over an alleged facilities incident, and it runs alongside a Department of Education civil-rights investigation opened June 1, 2026. A separate, disputed 2024 incident put Matthews on the map as a conservative-media figure, but the 2026 complaint deliberately does not rest on it — it asks only whether parents have a right to know district policy before, not after, they need it. All three proceedings are pending. No court has ruled.
