Another Federal Judge Strikes Down Biden’s Title IX Rewrite

The Washington Stand | Victoria Marshall | July 3, 2024

A federal judge in Kansas has temporarily blocked the Biden administration’s Title IX rewrite to four more states on Tuesday, making this the third federal court to strike down the rule.

U.S. District Judge John Broomes granted a preliminary injunction prohibiting the Department of Education from enforcing its rewrite of Title IX, which expands the definition of sex discrimination to include gender identity, to schools in Kansas, Alaska, Utah, and Wyoming.

The ruling not only shields the plaintiff states but also every school attended by the members of Young America’s Foundation, Female Athletes United, and the children of Mom’s for Liberty members who joined the lawsuit with the four states. The three organizations have until July 15 to submit to the court the list of schools their members or members’ children attend to be exempt from the rule.

“We have had many wins in court, but to me, this is the biggest one yet,” Kansas Attorney General Kris Kobach (R) said in a statement. “It protects girls and women across the country from having their privacy rights and safety violated in bathrooms and locker rooms and from having their freedom of speech violated if they say there are only two sexes.”

The new rule, which was supposed to take effect August 1, expands the definition of sex discrimination to include transgender-identifying children, which will allow students to use single-sex facilities, including bathrooms and locker rooms, according to their gender identity, not biological sex.

“The rule is an affront to civil liberties and common sense,” said Meg Kilgannon, Family Research Council’s senior fellow for Education Studies. “It requires the affirmation of ‘transgender status’ by everyone in an educational setting. Teachers and students will be required to use the pronouns of choice of the ‘transgender’ student, and teachers will be required to keep gender transition plans secret from parents unless the child consents to sharing that information.”

Since releasing the updated rule for Title IX in April, the Biden administration has been subject to multiple lawsuits challenging its legality. Last month, a federal judge in Kentucky issued a preliminary injunction against the rule in Kentucky, Indiana, Ohio, Tennessee, Virginia, and West Virginia. A federal judge in Louisiana also halted the rule from taking effect in Louisiana, Mississippi, Montana, and Idaho.

Kilgannon told The Washington Stand the Kansas ruling is significant “because it is the fifth court to reject all or part of the rule, making review by the Supreme Court of the United States very likely.”

After the Supreme Court overturned Chevron last week in Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo, some legal experts are saying this all but guarantees the Title IX litigants’ success. Under Chevron, federal agencies were given deference by courts to interpret ambiguous statutes. Now, the courts once again have the authority to interpret whether the Biden administration has overstepped the meaning of laws.

In his ruling, Broomes, a Trump appointee, wrote “The legislative history [of Title IX] supports a finding that the term ‘sex’ referred to biological sex. As discussed, one of the principal purposes of the statute was to root out discrimination against women in education.”

Topics:The Courts, Title Ix, Good News, Biden Administration, Gender Identity