Oklahoma City – Attorney General Gentner Drummond filed a federal lawsuit on Monday (June 6) challenging the Biden Administration’s new change to Title IX rules that radically rewrites the longtime federal protections by adding gender identity.
Filed in U.S. District Court in the Western District of Oklahoma, the suit asserts that the U.S. Department of Education (USDOE) under Education Secretary Miguel Cardona has created an unconstitutional reworking of Title IX protections.
“In doing so … it ignores the literal text of the statute and the purpose behind the creation, it disregards the lack of public support for the proposed rule, and it jeopardizes the equal opportunity that has been afforded to female athletes ever since the establishment of the statute,” states the filing.
“The Department attempts to make these drastic and detrimental changes while relying on a Supreme Court case that has no connection to Title IX. Perhaps worst of all, implementation of the Final Rule would serve to isolate and deny the group of athletes that the statute was originally designed to promote and protect – female athletes.”
The suit notes that the changes actually harm female students.
“Students of both sexes will experience violations of their bodily privacy by students of a different sex,” the lawsuit states.
“Indeed, the Final Rule also ignores psychological and safety concerns. For instance, a recent study points out that ‘limited research has explored girls’ experiences of competing on boys’ sports teams,’ noting unique challenges to female athletes. … Female athletes describe ‘having to navigate tensions and problematic assumptions of girls’ inferiority in sport.’ Meanwhile, research shows that female athletes are more willing to participate in single-sex athletics and less likely to feel self-conscious in single-sex athletics.”
The litigation also notes that the rule violates the Tenth Amendment by usurping authority belonging to the States and to Congress.
The Title IX change, which is slated to take effect Aug. 1, conflicts with Oklahoma state law prohibiting transgender girls from taking part in women’s sports and requiring school bathroom use according to biological sex, not gender identity.
Monday’s filing reflects concerns Drummond expressed in a May 2023 public comment to the USDOE opposing the then-proposed rule as being “riddled with flaws.”
Read the filing here:
https://www.oag.ok.gov/sites/g/files/gmc766/f/documents/2024/24-05-06_complaint.pdf .
The May 2023 public comment is available here
https://www.oag.ok.gov/sites/g/files/gmc766/f/documents/2024/ok_comment_-_ed-2022-ocr-0143-148822_attachment_1.pdf .
Additional Reporting on Title IX and other policy issues from CityNewsOKC
As reporter Pat McGuigan wrote in 2022, President Biden's efforts to pressure for transformation of the foundational Title IX provisions have drawn persistent opposition in Washington, D.C., in Oklahoma and around the United States.
( https://www.citynewsokc.com/education/bidens-title-ix-transgender-directives-on-hold-after-federal-judges-ruling/article_e8c4339c-06c9-11ed-9d4f-dfeb41b52faa.html )
Associated Press reporter Collin Binkley pointed out, in a mid-April story, the administration was pressing for what Binkley described as "The rights of LGBTQ+ students" and facing opposition from conservatives across the nation - and with some critical comments event from 'LGBTQ+' advocates who believed he was not sufficiently expanding the Title IX enforcement patterns.
( https://www.citynewsokc.com/news/biden-s-new-title-ix-rules-protect-lgbtq-students-but-avoid-addressing-transgender-athletes/article_6f5397be-0cc4-570e-acc2-3e3fba875040.html )
The controversy is not new, but recent Biden steps go beyond the language employed late in the presidency of Barack Obama in a letter on "transgender students.
( https://www.citynewsokc.com/education/obama-administration-s-dear-colleague-letter-on-transgender-students/article_b0de8275-a0b6-58fb-95a5-0b8b730df9bd.html )
In the print editions of The Oklahoman on Sunday (May 5), the newspaper's Molly Young sympathetically presented Drummond as seeking "Middle Ground". A sub-head for the story said "How the state's Republican attorney general is separating himself from his party."
"Culture warriors" is a term of contemporary journalistic writing that inclines toward an expression of opinion, rather than traditional and fair-balanced word usage. “Culture warrios” is typically applied to cultural conservatives but not to their opponents in public policy development, including LGBTQ+ advocates.
As of late on Monday, May 6, Molly Young's article had not been posted or was not readily discoverable on The Oklahoman website. That is not unusual because, as with other news organizations with 24/7 journalism, there is sometimes a delay between an article appearing online or, on the other hand, in print.
NOTE: Pat McGuigan, formerly editorial editor at The Oklahoman, contributed to this report. Pat worked with the late E.L. Gaylord, who was politically conservative. The Oklahoman is now owned by USA Today. Pat is presently Editor Emeritus for CityNewsOKC, formerly known as The City Sentinel.
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