On the 50th anniversary of Title IX, President Joe Biden proposed extending the civil rights law’s protections to transgender students, a move which could force facilities that receive federal funding to allow biological men to use women’s facilities and compete on their sports teams.
Title IX, which was signed into law by President Richard Nixon in 1972, is meant to protect women and girls from discrimination on the basis of sex, but more recent presidential administrations, namely that of Barack Obama and Donald Trump, have contended with the issue of whether this ought to apply to protections for individuals on the basis of gender identity as well.
The Biden administrations proposed rule change would reverse the Trump administration’s interpretation that Title IX only applied to discrimination against individuals on the basis of sex, rather than sexual and gender identity.
Education Secretary Miguel Cardona said in a statement that the change is meant to “protect LGBTQI+ students from discrimination based on sexual orientation, gender identity, and sex characteristics.”
“Over the last 50 years, Title IX has paved the way for millions of girls and women to access equal opportunity in our nation’s schools and has been instrumental in combating sexual assault and sexual violence in educational settings,” Cardona said on June 23, the anniversary of Title IX, as The Daily Wire reported.
“As we celebrate the 50th Anniversary of this landmark law, our proposed changes will allow us to continue that progress and ensure all our nation’s students – no matter where they live, who they are, or whom they love – can learn, grow, and thrive in school,” the statement continued.
Title IX currently reads that “No person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any educational program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance.”
The “basis of sex” is what has been interpreted differently by the three most recent presidential administrations, with Biden and Obama seeking to define this as sexual and gender identity.
In 2016, Obama’s administration issued guidance that the protections ought to apply to transgender students who sought to use bathroom facilities that corresponded with their gender identity, but the Trump administration reversed this decision, leaving it up to state and local entities.
Just one day earlier, former Secretary of Education under President Donald Trump, Betsy DeVos, warned that the Biden administration was likely to take such a step as it did on Thursday, which she characterized as “a bridge too far.”
“That they would attempt to expand the definition of biological sex through a rulemaking process, it really is a bridge too far,” she said, as Fox News reported.
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