Federal judge stops Biden admin’s effort to distort Title IX with gender ideology
“As this Court and others have explained, expanding the meaning of ‘on the basis of sex’ to include ‘gender identity’ turns Title IX on its head,” the judge wrote.
He also said that the attempted change to Title IX was ‘vague and overbroad’ and ‘arbitrary and capricious.’
A federal judge in Kentucky stopped President Joe Biden’s efforts to make Title IX protections apply to men who claim their so-called “gender identity” is female.
Judge Danny Reeves issued the judgment on Thursday, writing that Biden’s Department of Education “exceeded its statutory authority” in revising Title IX the way it did. “Put simply, there is nothing in the text or statutory design of Title IX to suggest that discrimination ‘on the basis of sex’ means anything other than it has since Title IX’s inception—that recipients of federal funds under Title IX may not treat a person worse than another similarly-situated individual on the basis of the person’s sex, i.e., male or female,” he wrote.
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“As this Court and others have explained, expanding the meaning of ‘on the basis of sex’ to include ‘gender identity’ turns Title IX on its head,” Reeves continued.
The judge also determined that the Title IX revision violated Constitutional rights by forcing teachers and others to use so-called “preferred pronouns” for students who claimed they “identify” with a different gender than their actual biological sex. “Put simply, the First Amendment does not permit the government to chill speech or compel affirmance of a belief with which the speaker disagrees in this manner,” Reeves wrote.
The judge also called Biden’s revision “vague and overbroad,” as well as “arbitrary and capricious,” and notes the Department “does not provide a reasoned explanation for departing from its longstanding interpretation of Title IX.”
Biden’s proposed changes to Title IX have been called “grotesque” and immediately caused widespread controversy when revealed.
Many who are opposed to the Department’s revisions noted that Title IX is meant to protect women from sex-based discrimination, a purpose that runs contrary to changing such protections to also apply to men who claim they are women.
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The regulation faced determined opposition, being blocked in 26 states, and criticized by President-elect Donald Trump, who vowed he would immediately reverse it upon taking office, the Associated Press noted.
Tennessee attorney general Jonathan Skrmetti rejoiced at Reeves’s decision, saying it was “another massive win for TN and the country,” as reported by Inside Higher Ed.
The decision comes after the Biden administration previously halted another effort that would have forced all states to allow men to compete in female sports in colleges and universities.
