Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has taken legal action against the Biden Administration over what he describes as an "unlawful federal rule" that would redefine sex discrimination protections under Title IX. The suit claims the move would endanger the safety and integrity of women's spaces in educational institutions. According to a press release from Ken Paxton's office, the Department of Education's regulatory amendments wrongfully expand the term "sex" to encompass "gender identity," a change that Paxton argues transgresses the Constitution and the intentions of Congress when Title IX was enacted.
Paxton's lawsuit highlights the risk posed to women by allowing biological males to access female-only areas, such as restrooms and locker rooms, if they identify as female. The Attorney General maintains that this reinterpretation of Title IX coerces schools into complying with a radical gender ideology or face the possibility of losing federal funds. Initially introduced as informal guidance, the Biden Administration has now chosen to formalize the rule within the Code of Federal Regulations, an act that Paxton says exceeds its authority.
The new definitions also have implications for due process, critics say. Echoing concerns from the Trump Administration's tenure, the lawsuit highlights that the rule could dilute safeguards against the improper handling of sexual harassment allegations by redefining harassment to potentially include constitutionally protected activities, such as using biologically accurate pronouns. "Texas will not allow Joe Biden to rewrite Title IX at whim, destroying legal protections for women in furtherance of his radical obsession with gender ideology," Paxton stated. According to the Texas Attorney General's office, this new application of the law is "plainly illegal, undemocratic, and divorced from reality."
America First Legal is providing support as co-counsel in the lawsuit. AFL President Stephen Miller has expressed strong opposition to the changes, condemning them as detrimental to women's rights. "Biden’s new Title IX regulation is a vile obscenity: it forces women and girls to share locker rooms and restrooms with men," Miller said, speaking on the rule's ramifications. "It forces them to call a he, a she, and to pretend in every way that a man is a woman, humiliating, degrading, and erasing women," according to a press release by the Texas Attorney General's office. Texas has previously sued the Biden Administration over initial attempts to enforce similar policies, indicating an ongoing battle between state and federal perspectives on gender and education law.
