WASHINGTON – Twenty-six GOP-led states are suing the Biden administration over Title IX changes aimed at protect LGBTQ+ students against discrimination in schools.
Less than a month after the U.S. Department of Education published a final rule aimed at doing just that protect against discrimination “based on gender stereotypes, sexual orientation, gender identity and gender characteristics,” a wave of Republican attorneys general began to question this solution.
The revised rule, which goes into effect August 1, requires schools to “take immediate and effective action upon receiving notice of conduct that may reasonably constitute sex discrimination in their educational programs or activities.”
The lawsuits come from Alabama, Alaska, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee and Texas. Utah, Virginia, West Virginia and Wyoming.
All attorneys general in the 26 states suing in the final ruling are members of the Republican Attorneys General Association.
Various advocacy groups and school boards have also taken up legal actions taken by states. The lawsuits contain similar language and arguments that strongly oppose the final rule. They argue that the up-to-date rules raise First Amendment concerns and allege violations of the regulations Administrative Procedure Act.
LGBTQ+ advocates say the revised rules provide students with necessary protections and are consistent with applicable law.
“Our children’s experience in schools should be about learning, making friends and developing as a young person. LGBTQ+ students deserve the same opportunities,” Sarah Warbelow, vice president of legal affairs for the LGBTQ+ advocacy group Human Rights Campaign, said in an emailed statement. “By filing these lawsuits, state attorneys general are attempting to rob LGBTQ+ students of their rights, which illustrates a complete disregard for the humanity of LGBTQ+ students.”
GOP states join forces against up-to-date regulations
In the last attempt Alaska, Kansas, Utah and Wyoming sued Biden administration on Tuesday, accusing the Department of Education of trying to “politicize our nation’s education system in order to accommodate the radical ideological views of the Biden administration and its allies.”
The lawsuit alleged that under the updated regulations, teachers, coaches and administrators would be required to “recognize, affirm, and affirm students’ ‘gender identity’ regardless of the religious beliefs of those speaking on the issue, in violation of the First Amendment.”
In another lawsuit, a group of southern states — Alabama, Florida, Georgia and South Carolina – sued the administration in Federal Court in Alabama on up-to-date regulations.
Republican Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall he said Since taking office, President Joe Biden has “brazenly attempted to use federal funds to impose radical gender ideology on states that reject it at the ballot box.”
“Now the target is our students. The threat is that if Alabama’s public schools and universities do not comply, the federal government will defund us,” Marshall said in a news release.
The lawsuit also drew praise from Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who said that “Biden is abusing his constitutional authority to push an ideological agenda that harms women and girls and is contrary to the truth.” He added that Sunny state “will not comply” and will instead “fight Biden’s harmful agenda.”
Individual states are suing the administration
Meanwhile, some states have decided to file individual lawsuits against the administration.
In Texas, Republican Attorney General Ken Paxton sued the Biden administration tardy last month Federal Court in Amarillo. Earlier this week, Paxton filed an amended complaint, adding two up-to-date ones plaintiffs added.
In Press release of April 29Paxton said the Lone Star State “will not allow Joe Biden to rewrite Title IX as he sees fit, destroying legal protections for women in the name of his radical obsession with gender ideology.”
Republican Attorney General of Oklahoma Gentner Drummond filed a lawsuit against the Biden administration earlier this month in a federal court in Oklahoma. The state department of education he also filed a separate lawsuit against the Biden administration.
A mix of states
In tardy April, Republican attorneys general in Indiana, Kentucky, Ohio, Tennessee, West Virginia and Virginia filed a lawsuit against Biden administration in federal court in Kentucky.
The states argued that the U.S. Department of Education “used its rule-making power to transform a law intended to equalize opportunities between the sexes into a much broader system of its own development.”
Idaho, Louisiana, Mississippi and Montana he also sued the Biden administration in tardy April, echoing language used in other related lawsuits. Seventeen local ones school boards in Louisiana also joined the states.
Earlier this month Arkansas, Iowa, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota and South Dakota he also brought the collective legal challenge to the final rule.
A Department of Education spokesman said the department does not comment on pending litigation, but noted that “a condition of receiving federal funds is that all federally funded schools are required to comply with the final regulations.” They added that the department looks forward to “working with school communities across the country to ensure that every student has Title IX’s guarantee of school nondiscrimination.”
The department has not yet developed a separate rule establishing up-to-date criteria for transgender athletes. So far, 24 states have passed laws prohibiting transgender students from playing sports consistent with their gender identity, according to Traffic Development Project.
