On Tuesday, Alliance Defending Freedom attorneys announced that they have filed a federal lawsuit against the Biden administration on behalf of the Rapides Parish School Board, which represents 42 schools with 20,000 students in Lousiana. The lawsuit challenges the administration's redefining of sex under Title IX to reflect chosen gender identity and not biological definitions.
The Biden administration's changes in the application of the 1972 federal law "will force schools to impose widespread harms on young people and deny free speech rights," the legal group argues.
The lawsuit says:
The Biden administration’s redefinition of the word “sex” in Title IX forces schools across the country to embrace a controversial gender ideology that harms children—including the very children it claims to help. And it fundamentally undermines the statute Congress enacted fifty years ago.
Under the new criteria, male students who identify as females will be permitted access to girls' private areas such as bathrooms, locker rooms, and showers, participate in girls' physical education classes, and play on girls' sports teams, despite contradictory information surrounding the athletic program impacts.
In a statement, the non-profit legal organization wrote:
On April 19, the Biden administration announced it would redefine “sex” in Title IX rules to include “gender identity,” requiring schools to ignore the biological distinction between male and female in favor of “an individual’s sense of their gender.”
The Department of Education’s fundamental and radical rewriting of federal law forces schools across the country to embrace a controversial gender ideology that harms children—including the very children it claims to help. Schools will have to allow males who identify as female to enter girls’ private spaces like bathrooms, locker rooms, and showers; to participate in girls’ physical education classes; and—despite logically inconsistent disclaimers saying otherwise—to play on girls’ sports teams.
ADF Senior Counsel Natalie Thompson said:
The Biden administration’s radical redefinition of sex turns back the clock on equal opportunity for women, undermines fairness, and threatens every student’s safety and privacy. The administration continues to ignore biological reality, science, and common sense. The Rapides Parish School Board, and other schools and teachers across the country, are right to stand against the enforcement of this extreme gender ideology, which will have devastating consequences for students, teachers, administrators, and families.
In the past week and a half since the rule change, Florida and Oklahoma have rebuffed the new criteria.
As RedState's Jeff Charles previously reported:
In a post on X, [Florida Governor Ron] DeSantis posted a video declaring that Florida “will not comply, and we will fight back.”
“We are not going to let Joe Biden try to inject men into women’s activities. We are not going to let Joe Biden undermine the rights of parents, and we are not going to let Joe Biden abuse his constitutional authority to try to impose these policies on us here in Florida.”
Alliance Defending Freedom works on legal issues protecting religious freedom, free speech, parental rights, and the sanctity of life. The group indicated that this is the first of many legal challenges they intend to bring against Biden's assault on girls and women by eroding their protections under Title IX.
Read More:
Florida Becomes Latest State to Tell Biden Administration Where to Stick Its New Title IX Rules
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