BREAKING🚨🏳️‍🌈 A Wisconsin Principal of the Year says school board members FABRICATED "grooming" accusations against him, then handed the fake documents to activists to destroy his career. Jeffrey Peterson ran Raymond School in Franksville, a pre-K through eighth grade school of about 400 kids in Racine County. It is his own alma mater and the first school he ever taught in. He took over as principal in 2021, after roughly three decades in Wisconsin education and a mayoral proclamation for his work. The only reason his employer knew he is gay, his amended federal complaint says, is that he asked about insurance benefits for the partner he has been with for decades. In April 2023, interim superintendent Michael Garvey gave him a scathing performance evaluation. The two men had worked together 34 days. It was the first poor review in Peterson's 29 years in Wisconsin schools, the complaint states, and it came after Garvey allegedly made remarks to him about a gay teacher who "didn't fit in." The suit says an unelected anti-gay operative, Arthur Binhack, was given access to the school's staff, its policies and its employee records, and then put out flyers accusing Peterson of "sexualizing and grooming" children. Board members Kari Morgan, Gwen Keller, Audrey Kostuch and Amanda Falaschi are accused of assembling a document falsely stating Peterson was under investigation for inappropriate conduct with kids. It went up on a local Moms for Liberty chapter's Facebook page in October 2023. The chapter's then vice chair, Joann Koenecke, allegedly handed the manipulated records to the press. That August, about 30 neighbors had shown up at the monthly board meeting to praise his leadership. Weeks later he was on leave, and the board voted 4-1 against renewing his contract. The lone vote for him came from Amy Helvick, who said publicly he wasn't being fairly represented. "The Defendants and their proxies fabricated a pretext to fire Peterson based on his sexual orientation," the complaint reads. He applied to more than a dozen Wisconsin districts and went a full year without work in the field. He is asking for back pay, punitive damages, and the redaction of the accusations still sitting in his public records. If you appreciate Gay News, it would mean the world if you followed my page. Thank you for being here.