The uproar continues over President Biden’s action to rewrite the landmark federal civil rights law known as Title IX. The law, enacted in 1972 prohibits sex-based discrimination in any school or any other education program that receives funding from the federal government.
Under the new rules, sex discrimination includes discrimination based on gender identity as well as sexual orientation.
The changes drew immediate criticism from Megan Degenfelder, Wyoming’s State Superintendent of Public Instruction.
“I am outraged by the Biden Administration’s action to effectively repeal Title IX protections for women in America,” she said. “Not only does the Biden Administration continue to attack the protections of biological women and the rights of parents, but it does so without any Congressional action. These rules fully open the door to biological males abusing rights afforded to women by Congress in Title IX, and they also trample on parental rights by requiring K-12 schools to accept a child’s gender identity regardless of biological sex without parental input.”
In fact, the law center associated with the Independent Women’s Forum is “preparing to sue the Biden administration to enjoin this unlawful action,” it announced Friday.
“The Department of Education can’t just rewrite the statute by administrative fiat. We are confident the courts will remind the Department of this basic principle and strike down this unlawful rule,” stated Jennifer Braceras, vice president for legal affairs at IWF, in a news release.
The suit has the backing of Betsy DeVos, education secretary under President Donald Trump. In a post on X, she wrote, “This regulation is an assault on women and girls.”
“It makes it a federal requirement that boys be allowed in girls bathrooms in elementary schools. It makes it a federal requirement that men be allowed to play women’s sports, putting their safety, privacy and competitive opportunity at risk. And it makes it a federal requirement that feelings, not facts, dictate how Title IX is enforced,” DeVos stated.
While the Biden administration argued the rewrite does not make a final determination on transgender athletes, the 1,577-page rule mentions “athletics” 31 times, “sports” 10 times and “team” 111 times.
Conservatives are also concerned that the new rule will force people to use others’ preferred gender pronouns.
“Free speech is clearly threatened by the mandatory use of pronouns inconsistent with a person’s biological sex,” Christiana Kiefer, senior counsel for the Alliance Defending Freedom wrote. “Words matter, and redefining ‘sex’ to include sexual orientation and gender identity necessarily implies a different message that many will not want to express.”
The updates are expected to take effect in August.
