Michele Blair scoffs when she mentions LGBTQ+ youth. “At Appomattox High School… all the kids were bi and trans and emo and gay, and, and, and goth,” she says, dramatically rolling her eyes heavenward, during a press conference to introduce Sage’s Law, a proposed piece of legislation named after Blair’s grandchild. This air of no-nonsense incredulity returns many times when Blair references the period of time her grandchild (who Blair legally adopted at the age of two), identified as a trans boy. That child, who according to Blair has returned to using she/her pronouns and birth name, is the Sage who is referenced in Sage’s Law.
The proposed legislation itself is relatively straightforward. It would force schools in Virginia to immediately contact parents as soon as a child indicates they might be transgender. It also clarifies that a parent failing to affirm a trans child’s identity cannot, on its own, be considered child abuse. (As a reminder, Assigned has long agreed with the latter, and urged against separating children from their families in cases where the parents refuse to affirm a child’s trans identity.) However, the way that one story, concerning a family struggling to recover from numerous traumas, is being used to support the law is far more complex.
Some aspects of the story are clear. Blair is the paternal grandmother and adopted parent of Sage, a female-assigned youth. Sage began struggling with mental health issues in middle school, at or near the onset of puberty. The child started 9th grade at Appomattox High School in 2021, but by late August had run away from home. During the approximately two weeks when Sage attended Appomattox the 14-year-old came out as a trans boy at school, and went by the name Draco.
The rest is more difficult to pin down. Thus far the story has only seen coverage in the right wing press, which our readers will know is not known for accuracy, ethics, or careful reporting practice. (Here’s the story as covered by the Daily Wire and the Federalist.)
Here’s how the child’s grandmother describes events: Blair claims her child (who went by Draco and used he/him pronouns throughout this period), was sex trafficked to Maryland and sexually assaulted multiple times by adult men, before being rescued by the FBI 9 days after having run away. The child then became the center of a difficult and protracted child welfare case in Maryland, which eventually resulted in no finding of abuse on the part of the grandparents. The child was supposed to be moved to a treatment center in Virginia appropriate for a trans boy, but before this could happen the child ran away again, and was again allegedly sex-trafficked, this time winding up in Texas. When the child was found, authorities in Texas returned the child to the treatment center in Virginia. While in treatment in Virginia, Blair says, the child began asking for girls’ clothing and re-identifying as a girl. Blair was eventually able to sign the child out against medical advice, with the help of conservative lawyers who had, by this point, become involved in the case.
You can watch Blair telling the full story on YouTube, in a press conference for the Family Foundation, a conservative Christian organization in Virginia that advocates for “policies based on Biblical principles.”
Regardless of the details, which again have yet to be verified by a legitimate news outlet, it seems clear that both Sage and her grandmother were deeply traumatized. Blair seems to believe that, if the high school had only informed her that Sage was presenting as a boy, all of the trauma she and Sage went through during that period could have been avoided. Without more information or mainstream reporting it’s difficult to evaluate or even fully understand the reasons for that belief. Assigned did make attempts to contact individuals closer to the story, but considering the trauma this family has been through and the sensitivity of the topic, we were not surprised that our efforts did not result in any new information. News reports and social media posts substantiate the child having gone missing twice.
What should we make of Sage’s Law? As mentioned above, the provision to clarify that misgendering or failing to affirm a child’s gender identity on its own should not be considered child abuse is perfectly fine. It’s probably unnecessary, as Virginia has never removed children from their parents for that reason, but it’s something we should all agree should never happen. The child welfare system is brutal and traumatizing, and even very imperfect families are better for children than group homes or foster care.
However, the requirement that schools immediately notify parents if a child says they’re trans is a very bad idea, as we’ve written more than once. You don’t even have to take our word for it! The very trans-skeptical New York Times Opinion columnist Michelle Goldberg also agrees.
In this specific case, it’s impossible to know whether or not Michele Blair learning her child was going by the name Draco at school, during the very brief window when this was happening, would have protected Sage or her family from harm. Certainly the specific chain of events that ended with Sage running away would have happened differently if her grandmother hadn’t just found out Sage went by Draco at school earlier that same day, but who knows if the child would still have run away or not. It’s common for people coping with trauma to fixate on some small detail that, if it had happened differently, would have changed the outcome of events. Sage’s grandmother’s belief that, if she’d only known Sage was using a different name at school, all the family’s problems would have been avoided may be best understood through that lens.
On the other hand, there is likely some truth in the idea that Sage was made more vulnerable to predators by identifying as trans online. Trans youth are vulnerable, though the one thing that is believed to improve their outcomes is having affirming parents at home. Unfortunately, that doesn’t mean that forcibly outing children to conservative parents will improve their safety. It’s easy to imagine many scenarios where the opposite could be true. For example, a child whose parents grew angry and forbade them from identifying as trans at school might suddenly become far more vulnerable to online predators in the wake of such a disclosure. The LGBTQ+ community has innumerable stories where children run away or are kicked out by their parents and then come to terrible harm, and the social science data has numerous results supporting the idea that unsupportive families place LGBTQ+ youth at higher risk.
The use of Sage’s story to support the forced outing of children to unsupportive conservative parents is unfortunate. It’s not obvious that the proposed law would even have helped Sage, but it seems certain that it would hurt other vulnerable children, ironically putting them more at risk for the exact types of harm that befell Sage. Luckily, it seems to have little or no chance of passing the Virginia legislature at this time.
Evan, I give you so much admiration. This story, and the additional writing you did about it in your email to subscribers, show yet again the way that journalism and ethics join to exalt the best features of both. In the email, you shared your difficulties in figuring how to approach and report this story, and concluded that the best way forward was that the piece "needed to be one that I’d feel comfortable with Sage coming across." Another way of saying this might be that you centered the consideration of the most vulnerable person within the story – an approach that is sometimes considered a softening or less-rigorous way to approach reporting. Yet this piece proves that’s not so; journalists can have heart and rigor, and the result is integrity. Thank you, yet again, for your work! -Joy Williams
Thank you! A benefit of being independent is that I can decide what the ethics of my site are going to be. This was a really tough one for me!
Another story from a liberal writer tainted with more lies than truth. In no universe can you prove with hard data that hiding children who wish to suddenly identify as trans is a safer option for them, nor does any data support that affirming parents at home improves the outcomes of trans-identified children. Giving parents the option to process what is going on with their children, whose circumstances are all unique, and giving their parents the choice to take their child to see psychiatric care and medical advice is key.
I am an independent researcher (not affiliated with this site) with a small background in scientific journalism in Japan and I collect studies and documents to inform myself on these kinds of topics. I have collected exactly half a dozen published and peer-reviewed studies dating back to 2013 (Parental Support and Mental Health Among Transgender Adolescents, Lisa Simons et al., 2013) regarding the mental health outcomes (life suicidality, symptoms of depression, anxiety disorders, etc.) of adolescents in various affirming and non-affirming environments, showing consistently that there is a significant decrease in both the physical and mental health of subjects who did not have affirming environments. In fact, adolescents in affirming environments were often likely to have an equal or greater mental health outcome than the non-gender dysphoric control groups, though this varied depending on the study. Not only are the results overwhelmingly significant and pointing toward affirmation as the best approach for the mental health of adolescentsーthere are also zero published, peer-reviewed studies I can find that suggest otherwise.
I do not disparage parents who find themselves confused or concerned when their children show signs of gender dysphoria. I only wish that they take their child to reputable medical institutions that can properly diagnose their child with GD if necessary and inform the child’s parents of the best practices according to existing science and standards of care available.
That’s fine, but these studies are deeply flawed, very small and crippled with statistical sampling problems, like almost all such advocate studies. Almost all the studies cited with regards to trans are of poor quality as the British MedicaL Journal discovered. Unreproducible is the word
Unless there is a known severe threat to a child, there is no excuse or justification for substituting the school for a parent. Parents can give their kids a hard time over grades, clothes, jewelry, fighting, and many other things. That does not mean they are wrong or bad, and disciplining and directing kids away from things is a duty of parenting. It isn’t to be your Child’s best friend or a fellow child. And not all parents have to follow Woke Ideology on gender.
Punishing all parents because a few might be exceptionally and outrageously cruel is collective punishment, disenfranchisement, and Big Brotherism at its very worst.
The story of Sage is heartbreaking. Obviously we need to know more facts. But we know enought to stop any more schools from putting themselves above parents or guardians and hiding things from them.
I came across this story recently in some news outlets presenting the child’s family’s story and saw several red flags in the way it was reported. When the only source of the story is reported to have been accused of abuse by institutions where victims of abuse are often treated, proper investigative journalism would at least attempt to contact the officials involved in the first or second apprehension and criminal investigation. Nonetheless, while I do not typically cite or source independent journalists for my own records, this looks to be the only article I can find that recognizes the red flags and discusses them in the broader context of these kinds of incidents. I appreciate your standard of ethics. Thank you.
Thank you for reading. What you are describing is exactly why I started an independent site- because some of these stories are slipping through the cracks, with no mainstream reporting covering them at all.
It is disappointing that the author felt the need to repeatedly comment on the supposed political affiliation of the grandmother and in general any parent who does not immediately support their Childs’ gender identity. It honestly takes away the validity to the other points made…. this might come as a shock, but there are plenty of liberal parents who have had a hard time being excited or supportive when learning about their kid transitioning. There are also plenty of conservatives who understand and embrace that decision. By making this a conservative( bad) and liberal( good) issue, it muddies the water on the rest of the writing….much like discrediting anything written in the Federalist and Daily wire simply bc they have conservative views….doing this literally makes this article no different than the others just mentioned.
There is so much more to this topic than scary conservative parents who by all accounts in this particular story, were not even given the opportunity to have a conversation about their child, simply bc non-family members decided on their own what the reaction would be. There was a time when political considerations did not need to be front and center in every issue…these are real people, with real pain and concerns for their loved ones..stripping it down in this manner is wrong….we as a whole need to start doing better.
Two quick things. First, I never said anything about the views of the grandmother. I don’t know the views of the grandmothers. I mentioned the affiliations of her law firm and the people pushing the law, and I spoke generally about unsupportive parents who share the views of that law firm and those people.
Second, the Federalist and the Daily Wire aren’t news sites. They aren’t carefully sourced or fact checked, they don’t issue corrections or make sure to offer a chance to comment to all sides. This site, Assigned Media, is a news site. We follow all relevant journalistic standards and ethics. They are not. It has nothing to do with their politics, just their professionalism.
Interesting how your opinion is exactly why this young 14-year-old ran away. Not only did the school not talk to the parents, neither did the public defender in Maryland. Had Maryland allowed this child’s parents to visit her, or even be allowed to call her, this story would have a different ending. Had Maryland given her trauma care, this story would have a different ending. Had this public defender even bothered to communicate with these parents when they had her placed in jail, this story would have a different ending. Seems the complete lack of communication caused the extreme trauma thus child was forced to endure. She needed her family. Not a jail cell. And certainly not a boy’s home with all high risk teenage boys. How can that decision ever be justified? Especially after this child was rescued from a 2nd time offender and sex trafficked. So yes, dear author of this heartless article, the truth will come out in a court of law. Stay tuned…
The honest truth from any point of view outside those directly involved is that we do not have nearly enough information to know what specifically caused this child to run away, first from home and then from Maryland. I can personally picture this child being afraid of having been outed, and also of having to be returned later, just as clearly as you can picture some miraculous family bonding saving the child from sex-traffickers. I would prefer the child’s own account, if it were safe for them to do so, at least insofar as it would inform the public of the further context surrounding the incidents that were left out by the family. Either way, there is a lot of information missing and this article does a very good job of providing more general context around the abuse trans children in non-affirming households often receive, and the institution the child was sent to upon returning home that might influence the way this story has been told in right-leaning sources.
imagine yourself at 14 again. did you ever lie to someone about your situation at home to persuade someone to side with you and result to getting what you want? Fast forward to your current age.. do you agree with yourself that what you wanted at that time was the best for you? We all have our own story of how youth made us reckless, confused, and emotional. The things that we felt at that age were almost always magnified 10 fold. In an ideal world where parents know every single answer to every single situation they are faced with involving their teen child, I would say this is good — outing the child to “unsupportive” parents. However, there are many grey areas here. Keep in mind the answer to my first question.. are all people truthful and without self interest that we should treat every case of a teen outing themselves in school as something that should be kept from their parents and even go to the extent of them being taken out of their home as what happened to Sage? How qualified are all the adults in this case to take a case like this? How qualified is the system? What would make a parent “supportive”?
Hey Evan, this is a great article. I just listened to Nick Freitas relay a version of Sage’s story on the floor of the House of Delegates. Much of the story didn’t add up. I was glad to find this even-handed look at what could and could not be verified as facts about this story.
Have you not read or listened to the full testimony? You are shocked that people are using REAL EXPERIENCES to push laws that apply to those exact situations. Mrs. Blair was a Gender Non-Conforming style parent, the school system kept her status secret, the state "protected her in Maryland, and she was housed in the male dormitory according to her gender identification. So these are all the things that you are pushing for and say protect trans kids. However, this is a real-world application of those standards and they failed abysmally. This young girl will bear those scars for the rest of herself because of it. How many more Sages is it going to take before you stop virtue signaling for the clout of strangers on the internet and actually start caring for people?
Just to be clear, this is not a news article, it’s an OP-ED piece. Journalists stick to the W’s and do not insert opinion into an article. The entire piece is riddled with opinion. Unfortunately too many so-called news sources, including several large, seemingly respectable, media sources have mixed opinion with facts and created a muddied view of what is actual news and what is partisan propaganda for their viewpoint. This is true for both the right and the left.
Just to be clear this wasn’t promoted as anything other than an op-ed piece, since they deliberately and distinctly remind the reader of their position in the article. But I agree with you completely that too many other sources (on both sides) claiming to be “news” are propaganda instead. I miss the days when reporters told us what happened in the world without telling us how we should feel about it—or mocked and degraded people with differing opinions. I wish we could all be more like George W. Bush and Michelle Obama who are friends that treat each other respectfully and agree to disagree.
They’re trying to reintroduce this stupid bill again for 2026, and I was wondering if Assigned Media will report on any updates with it. As far as I know, there doesn’t seem to be any new details? 😅 I’ve especially not heard of anything from Sage’s perspective, only the grandmother