Brevard County father describes the hell his 7 y.o. daughter with Down syndrome was allegedly put through in the name of school board's mask mandate [video]

Moms for Liberty in Brevard County, Florida, recently posted a disturbing thread about an alleged incident in which a young girl with Down syndrome had a mask forcibly tied to her head in school at Ocean Breeze Elementary:

SHOCKING & DISTURBING: Parents discovered that their 7yo little girl with Downs Syndrome has had a mask tied to her head against her will since @brevardschools instituted their illegal mask policy. The parents were unaware this was happening until the child came home one day with

— M4L Brevard (@M4LBrevard) October 19, 2021

a saliva soaked mask tied with nylon rope around her head.
Sophia is non-verbal, has an oversized tongue and has sensory issues that prevent her from being able to wear a mask. The parents instructed the school that she was not to wear a mask due to her special needs after they

— M4L Brevard (@M4LBrevard) October 19, 2021

learned that a mask mandate was put in place. They had no reason to believe their sweet girl was being forced to wear a mask all day against her will because she went to school without one, she came home without one, and the teacher never reached out to the parents expressing an

— M4L Brevard (@M4LBrevard) October 19, 2021

issue with Sophia keeping a mask on.
When a mask was put on her face, she would immediately remove it. Again, she has sensory issues-

— M4L Brevard (@M4LBrevard) October 19, 2021

but for some reason, the adult that was supposed to be caring for Sophia felt the need to clip a mask to her face to prevent her from removing it. And when that didn't work, the adult resorted to tying it on with a rope.
What has happened to our society?

— M4L Brevard (@M4LBrevard) October 19, 2021

We have grown adults bullying & abusing our innocent children over a piece of cloth on their faces? Do we not see the absurdity in this concept? And despite what anyone else tells you, there is absolutely NO science that supports doing this to children.
Sophia's story is horrific

— M4L Brevard (@M4LBrevard) October 19, 2021

and should upset everyone, including @JenkinsBrevard who represents the school in district 3, where this incident took place. Instead, she has been too busy going on a national media tour to care about the very children she voted to force masks upon.
Sophia's parents have started

— M4L Brevard (@M4LBrevard) October 19, 2021

a GiveSendGo to raise funds to hire a lawyer so they can sue the people responsible for this abusive behavior, including @BrevardSchools.
The parents wrote, "October is Downs Syndrome Awareness Month and we humbly ask for your help in supporting our case to end the tyranny of the

— M4L Brevard (@M4LBrevard) October 19, 2021

BPS School Board & @MistyBelford. This madness must stop and the school must be held accountable for its abusive actions. On behalf of Sofia and all special needs children, especially those with Downs Syndrome, we are grateful for your support and prayers."

— M4L Brevard (@M4LBrevard) October 19, 2021

@VoteRandyFine @debbie_mayfield @GovRonDeSantis @thadaltman @tylersirois
You can give toward the lawsuit here: https://t.co/Lq1XbfWypd

— M4L Brevard (@M4LBrevard) October 19, 2021

More from the fundraising page:

On October 6th, our daughter Sofia stepped off of the school bus with a mask tied to her face with a nylon rope. Sofia has Downs Syndrome, and at seven years old, is nonverbal. Due to her condition, her tongue is enlarged. With the mask tied to her face, she was unable to breathe properly and unable to express her distress. My wife recognized Sofia’s panic, her face reddened from having her breathing restricted, and comforted Sofia after removing her mask and taking pictures of the rope tied around Sofia’s head to secure a mask to her face. “The mask was totally wet from her saliva.

The school put Sofia’s life at risk. For what? Her teachers and the school principal know about Sofia’s condition, and we sent her to school assured that she would not be masked due to the danger it could pose to her. After focusing first on Sofia, and taking some time to control our rage and anger at the school and the teachers for having taken such cruel action, we confronted the school principal and the teacher the following week. At that meeting, they admitted to having tied the mask to Sofia’s face using the nylon rope and admitted that this has been happening without our knowledge since the mask policy was put in place. The school could not explain what drove them to such madness. Unbelievably, their concern at that meeting seemed to be to keep things quiet.

…

Florida’s Parents’ Bill of Rights is supposed to protect us from seeing Sofia treated like a second-class citizen, her health concerns and fears disregarded by the school, but Sofia’s school disregarded her rights and our rights as our parents to make appropriate health care decisions for Sofia. First among those, as any parent can understand, is to ensure Sofia can breathe and is dealt with as the beautiful seven year old girl that she is. Since the Parents’ Bill of Rights means nothing to Sofia’s school, we have been in contact with Governor Ron DeSantis’ office, the Florida Board of Education, and Florida Senator Debbie Mayfield. We hope that the Governor and the Florida Board of Education will take appropriate action to ensure nothing like what happened to Sofia ever occurs again to another child in Florida.

Even more shocking, the school violated the Brevard County School Board’s so-called “Emergency K-12 Face Covering Requirement” by masking Sofia. The policy says that face coverings shall not be required for children with IEP or 504 plans documenting medical, physical or psychological contraindications. By the plain language of the policy, we trusted that the school would not mask Sofia. The School District placed Sofia at Ocean Breeze Elementary because of their resources for children like Sofia with special needs. We thought when we put her on the bus each morning that they were looking after her, not abusing her. How wrong we were.

There was a time when a story like this would’ve been literally unbelievable. That’s sadly not the case anymore.

A parent in our district told an unfortunately similar story at a board meeting this fall. People keep saying, "those are unique cases, exceptions are made." But they're not. Some teachers are convinced masks are life or death, and are thus willing to do these abusive things.

— Technically Judicial (@techjudge) October 20, 2021

How many more Sofias are out there?

I cannot articulate the rage that just welled up inside when I read this. I have to find the story because I’m hoping it’s not true. https://t.co/mRIdXfG6hi

— Hooch (@CompanyHooch) October 20, 2021

Sophia’s father, Dr. Jeffrey Steel, spoke about it today at an event with Gov. Ron DeSantis:

This girl’s dad is speaking at @GovRonDeSantis’ presser right now. https://t.co/fz0MqZDWLb

— Amy (@AmyA1A) October 20, 2021

The presser is here – Sofia’s dad Jeffrey Steel starts at around 21:30https://t.co/ID2LBQKDsS

— Amy (@AmyA1A) October 20, 2021

Devastating. Infuriating.

I listened to this. Utterly heartbreaking. I wish there would’ve been some actual movement at the presser

— KD (@KirseyBelle) October 20, 2021

Hopefully there’s plenty of movement still to come.

WHAT THE HELL https://t.co/BBpX9wsIlK

— Kate Paul Dillon. (@KatePaulDillon) October 20, 2021

This is horrific. https://t.co/gyaVcl8cp8

— Frank Costanza (@alhebertADACoor) October 20, 2021

As a parent of a special needs child – and also I'm a human being not a freaking monster – this enrages me. https://t.co/TiVPIlLSSo

— GluedThumbs (@GluedThumbs) October 20, 2021

This is abuse. https://t.co/9ADukzkK6j

— Karlyn Borysenko, most dangerous knitter alive 🧶 (@DrKarlynB) October 20, 2021

We’re not sure how else to characterize what’s allegedly been done to that little girl.

Our society is so, so broken. How have people with so much ignorance and hatred been given the responsibility to care for our most gentle souls? https://t.co/CIIzm9a4Hd

— Bethany S. Mandel (@bethanyshondark) October 20, 2021