South Boise Parents send their young children to White Pine Elementary to learn reading, writing, and math. There is also counselors available for when a child finds themselves in a bit of trouble. But what these young impressionable children are walking into on this K-6 campus is transgender ideology being treated as wallpaper and accessories. And now, it’s where the one brave education professional willing to call it out just got voted out of her volunteer union seat for speaking up about it.
April Chainey confirmed the result with me Monday morning. She was just voted out of her position as the volunteer ESP building-representative at White Pine elementary school in Southeast Boise. While she is still employed at White Pine as a paraprofessional and a dues-paying member of the Boise Education Association and the Idaho Education Association, her union colleagues no longer want her in that chair. Gee, I wonder why.
Chainey has been documenting what she has been seeing on the inside at White Pine Elementary. Classroom doors adorned with a pride-coded “Safe Space for all” sticker pointing to a national advocacy outfit whose materials push LGBTQIA2S+ curriculum, policy, clubs, and “action,” and not, say, a Boise School District parent handbook. Staff boards with LGBTQ Caucus flyers for union members that need more outside support grooming your children and covering their behinds.
Staff are offered laminated lanyards in transgender-flag colors with the phrase “I’m Here” in bold letters. The badge comes with a disclaimer that if you “do not support LGBTQ+ youth or issues, please do not wear or display the “I’m Here” badge. This should be of serious concern. The message these badges send is a very serious matter because staff who choose not to wear an “I’m Here” badge are effectively considered “unsafe.” This is extremely harmful to all students, not just gender confused students. It runs contrary to the culture that Idaho Public Education should be pursuing, which is all staff should be considered safe resources who can help direct students to the help and guidance they need. Instead, these badges build a culture of discrimination, exclusion, and ideological pressures.
Meanwhile, the creators of the badge (NEA-LGBTQ+ Caucus) have provided a QR code inside the badge packet that leads holders to the NEA-LGBTQ+ Caucus website. You read that correctly – the national teacher’s union has a nationwide caucus of union teachers and staff members, that work with your children, and have formed a caucus that is all about grooming children into the sick trans-ideology. Including links to a K-3rd grade lesson plan on “Why Say Gay?”
Chainey has described seeing staff wearing pride shirts, covering laptops and water bottles with similar stickers, and bringing NEA rainbow stickers for colleagues. If you are wondering if these things are allowed in our elementary schools, when Chainey asked the district to take the door sticker seriously, the answer was basically a shrug. On Aug. 29, 2025, the school principal wrote to Chainey in an email that these stickers were allowed and that she had no concerns. Area Director Teri Thaemert (now retired) followed on Sept. 2, 2025 writing that under the district’s reading of House Bill 41, the sticker was not a violation. That bill in question was passed in 2025 and prevents public schools from displaying the Pride Flag (and other non-governmental flags) on school property.
Curious on how far this ideology was entrenched in the system, Chainey noticed that the IEA membership application no longer stops at male and female. Chainey noticed the fields for selecting an applicant’s sex listed: Female, Male, Other, Transgender Female, Transgender Male, and Gender Expansive/Non-Conforming. Via emails provided by Chainey, she asked union leadership to drop that sexuality theater from the form. BEA President Tabitha Miller pointed her to then-IEA President Layne McInelly. McInelly, by Chainey’s account, called it demographics and said change runs through Delegate Assembly and the NEA. Miller later apologized if Chainey felt unheard, reminded her dues are voluntary, and invited her to run as a delegate. Basically keep paying your dues, stay quiet, or climb a ladder designed to exhaust you.
That brings us to last week. Chainey had been one of two volunteer union representatives for White Pine Elementary. This position tasked her with acting as a union contact for members at White Pine Elementary who may have an issue or need involvement of the union for a particular matter. Once Chainey started being more vocal about what she was seeing and concerned with, it appears her union colleagues conspired to find a replacement for her, so they could hold an election and choose a more friendly advocate to be their building representative.
Before the White Pine BEA vote, she sent members a candidate statement naming the lanyards, the GLSEN stickers, the calendar scrubbing that yanked “Happy Thanksgiving” from the school’s street side sign (while Halloween stayed,) pride-parade participation, and the seven-field gender membership form. She asked for adherence to parental rights and the removal of gender ideology from the public school.
Chainey lost her re-election to her opponent 15-1, with the Chainey providing the only vote in support of herself. Motive is secondary. Sequence is primary. She complained in writing in 2025. The stickers stayed. She complained to BEA and IEA in 2026. She was told to work within the system if she wanted to change anything. She then ran on her record defending parental rights and protecting children from trans-ideology. These union members just declared to all, who is really in charge and what flag they wave. These are hard-core radical leftists that even take umbrage to our wonderful American holiday known as Thanksgiving. Think I am kidding? At one point, Chainey was the one tasked with changing the street-side reader board for the school. After she finished putting up text regarding the Thanksgiving break days off last year, she was told to remove “Happy Thanksgiving” from the sign.
Idaho parents should ask Boise School District three questions in writing. Is glsen.org or GLISTEN.org an approved student resource that parents are aware of? Who ordered “Happy Thanksgiving” off the reader board, and does that order hit “Merry Christmas” the same way? And, most importantly, does any of the “gender affirming” propaganda going on violate H0352 that passed in 2025 prohibiting education on sexual orientation or gender identity from kindergarten through 12th grade?
The alarm has been going off for years now about how this ideology has invaded our most precious institution – the public school system. It’s time for parents, the media, and our elected officials to take a stand and take back our schools. Because the invasion is over, flag ban or not, our public schools are occupied territory and your children are their primary target.